Reverie
by Wolfaholic
Summary: Love is patient, love is kind.It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.It is not rude, it is not selfseeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.It always protect.
1. Chapter 1

I. Obsidian

I was in a garden of some sort that was inhumanly beautiful. Green was everywhere and a tree with a scaly serpent was in the middle of this life-filled garden. I had never seen a garden—no a _place_—as beautiful and life giving as this one. It seemed impossible for an average person like me to be in a garden that was so..._inhuman_.

I walked around this garden of hope and wonder, continuing to gaze upon the radiant beauty that this garden shown. I could feel the serene and tranquil presence that this radiant garden brought. It was like a perfect paradise that for some reason, I felt like I did not belong in.

I frolicked along in this garden of hope and wonder, feeling the need to lie down in the dew-filled blades of grass, so, I did. It felt so calm, relaxing, and I did not want to get up. I lay there, helpless and in my own little world.

I continued to rest in the soft grass, until I found the strength to stand up and walk. I sighed softly, my mint breath—that for some reason never smelled bad—spray everywhere like a spray can spraying graffiti on a brick wall of a building. My porcelain skin glistened like diamonds in the beautiful radiance. My long, red hair that people thought looked like flames, danced in the cool breeze while my unusual natural red-orange orbs watched the paradise that surrounded me.

I continued to walk, my hands swaying at my side when I did so. A lock of my fiery red hair accidentally fell freely in my porcelain face, though I quickly tucked it behind my left ear. I noticed a tree with gorgeous red apples on it, the same tree with the green serpent on it. The apples looked delicious, and so, I walked over to the tree.

"Greetings." The serpent told me with a hiss with a slight wisp. The creature was a little intimidating, the way it stared at me with his narrow goldenrod slits. The sunshine slits seemed to never close—I guess that was because the creature was a snake—and that intimidated me also, though, I just stared at the creature with no expression on my porcelain face.

"Hello." I said timidly, who would have known that a snake could talk? It waspretty strange to hear a serpent speak with me. However, I did wonder exactly _how _it could speak. On the bright side, I thought the wisp that this mysterious serpent had was funny; I had loved to hear people talk with a wisp.

"Your hair is quite lovely, if I might say so myself. The color of fire. It is a very beautiful shade of hair for considering a female of your age." The serpent replied with another wisp. The serpent's gaze at my hair was somewhat disturbing and made a shiver run down my spin. The serpent somehow managed to smile with coy within it.

"Exactly, where am I?" I asked tentatively. I had to know the paradise of which I was standing. I gazed upon the gorgeous horizon with my fire opal orbs. The snake

silently did a hiss to attract my attention to him.

"Oh, you do not know? This is the Garden of Eden." The snake slyly replied to

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me, and I scratched my head, a little confused. Garden of Eden? I had heard of that somewhere, but I couldn't place a finger on it. I blinked my fire-orange eyes as the snake did a quiet snicker, though it sounded like a hiss more.

"You look a little confused, dear. Why don't you take one of these delicious red apples and taste them? Maybe, you will be able to answer your questions then." The snake grinned devilishly, which actually made him _look _like the devil also. I reached out to grab the luscious carmine fruit, until I woke up.

Apparently, it was all just a dream. I looked down to see I was wearing my _Blue's Clues_ pajamas, and _no, _I was not a big baby. _Blue's Clues_ was a totally wicked show! I then heard my mother calling from the kitchen below me.

"Tragedy! Get down here!" I could hear my mother's normal soprano voice as she half-sang, half-yelled my name. Yes, Tragedy was my name. No, I was not a bad luck charm. No I was not gothic, and _no _I was not emo or suicidal. I hated how there were so many stereotypes about a name like Tragedy.

My name was Tragedy Eclipse Hooding. Yes, I agree, my name is very strange. My parents must have been desperate and decided to name me after the first thing they saw. I was seventeen, and I had two siblings. My sister was Constance Midnight Hooding, and she was six years old. I had a twin brother named Dominique Lunar Hooding, and he was seventeen except he was three minutes older. I had long, flowing red hair that rested on my petite shoulders. I had fire opal eyes, which were abnormally natural. My mother and I were the only ones in the entire family that had the same colored eyes and hair.

On the other hand, both Dominique and Constance had charcoal black hair. Constance's went down to her waist, and Dominique's was...well, like most other boys' hairstyles, short. Constance had dark goldenrod eyes and Dominique as well. They were both so similar, yet so different. Constance and Dominique had my father's look; he had jasper-colored orbs as well with the jet-black hair too.

My family lived in San Diego, California. Even though we lived in a hot city in a hot state, my family _never _got tan. We were always white; albino white. When we had first moved to San Diego, we attempted to tan, but all we did was stay pale. It was so strange though, and my friends would often make fun of me by saying I was an albino chick. I eventually got used to the dirty jokes my friends made, and they eventually stopped, finding that the jokes had no affect on me whatsoever.

"Coming, Mom!" I yelled back to my mother, indicating to her that I was up, and getting ready for the day. I pulled off my _Blue's Clues _pajamas and threw them into my magnolia-white laundry basket. I quickly pulled on a brown T-shirt that said "California Girl" on it. I then slipped on some tight cerulean blue jeans that showed off my skinny, but long legs.

I swung my door open and ran down the stairs for some good old breakfast. My mother, Lily Rose Hooding, was cooking scrambled eggs on the black frying pan. This morning, my mother had her fiery-red hair pulled into a bun with side bangs at the corner of her gloriously pale face. Her carmine lips twitched into a kind smile, her magnolia teeth flashing to me.

"Hello, dear." My mother said in her high soprano voice. My mother enjoyed singing a lot, and had many gigs at different churches every three days, so her voice

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naturally became high-pitched.

"Morning, Mom." I replied to my mom as I grabbed a fragile peach plate and sat at our oak table. Mom usually cooked scrambled eggs on special occasions...because today was the day we were going to move from our sunny San Diego, California to the cold Anchorage, Alaska.

"Are you ready for the big day?" My mother asked enthusiastically, though I just groaned a little and rolled my fiery orange orbs. Constance ran down the stairs, jumping around and giggling like a normal, hyper six year old would do.

"I thought I smelled eggs! Morning Mom! Morning Tragedy!" Constance yelled enthusiastically also. Constance started to blab about her dream last night that she was a princess in England and other unimportant things...though it made me wonder about my dream. What was with the devilish serpent and the apples? I then remembered that the Garden of Eden was in Genesis from the Bible. Although, why was the Garden of Eden in my dream? What did all of that have to do with me? The meaning was so obscure to me, like obsidian.

Suddenly, Dominique came down, looking a little irritated, though he kept his self-control. I snickered to myself as I watched my older brother walk down the stairs irritated.

"Constance, stop yelling, God." Dominique said to her sternly as he sat down on one of the birch chairs, right next to me. He had dark circles under his eyes that were possibly from a terrible night of no sleep. I just blinked my fire opals, watching his movements as he poured a bowl of Rice Krispies into a bowl.

"Hey, Dominique, are you ok?" I asked curiously. He just looked up at me with his goldenrod irises, giving me one of those death glares that say to you "leave me alone or else." I just laughed at his expression and then stopped once he held his fist up to me.

"Hey Dominique, didn't you know? Guys aren't supposed to hit girls." I snickered again as he then purposely dumped his bowl of cereal on my jeans. He pointed and laughed at me and I screamed so loud, you would think I was going to be murdered. Mom turned around and scowled at Dominique, ready to do another one of her famous lectures.

"Now Dominique, don't be mean to your sister." My mother started out with her lecture as I stood up, milk drenching my jeans, making myself look as if I wet my pants. Constance began giggling non-stop as she saw how I had milk and cereal all over my lap.

"Well, she was asking—"

"That is no reason to dump cereal on your loving sister's lap."

"_Loving_? Are you fricken' serious? She was _laughing _at me because I woke up in a bad mood!"

"That's still no reason to be mean to her. She's only eighteen." My mother pointed her index finger, looking at him disappointingly. I suppressed a laugh as a smile twitched at the corners of my Venetian-red lips.

"How come every time she does something to _me_, you end up on _her _side?" Dominique asked angrily as he then shook his head, saying that to forget the whole thing and that he was going to cross-country practice.

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"Hey, Mom, what time are we leaving?" Constance asked quietly with a touch of curiosity in her voice. My mother looked at me and pointed up the stairs, indicating to me that I needed to go change my jeans. As I walked up the stairs, I heard my mother tell Constance that we were leaving after school, and that the plane ride would take at least three or four hours.

I walked into my bedroom, unbuttoning and unzipping my jeans, and throwing them into the same basket that I had thrown my _Blue's Clues _pajamas. I walked over to my dresser, pulled out some khaki pants, and slipped them on. I hoped that these wouldn't be stained with something else too.

After a few minutes of changing my outfit, I walked out of my room, and ran down the stairs and waved goodbye to my mother as I dragged Constance out of the house so I could actually get to basketball practice on time.

I drove a lemon yellow Ferrari while my brother drove an ecru hummer. My family was a pretty wealthy family. My mother was a traveling singer who got lots of concerts; which meant lots of money. My father, Storm Vernon Hooding, was a doctor in the emergency room as the head doctor.

Constance sat in the backseat of the Ferrari, and I obviously sat in the driver's seat. The car started with a _VROOM _and I took off fast, I liked to drive fast, usually going over the speed limits, but strangely enough, a cop never caught me.

I enjoyed driving fast, so I was always on time, though mostly, even if I drove over the speed limits, I was usually late for basketball practice, because Constance always fiddled around at home with her Barbie's hair, outfit, and all that girly baby stuff for dolls.

I arrived to school at about 8:01 AM; I was one minute late for basketball practice. I sighed softly to myself as I took the key out of the ignition and placed them in my pockets. I swung my door open, and Constance did too. We both shut our doors once we were out, and I could see all my friends running the track mile: Brianna, Macy, and Violet.

"Hey you guys!" I yelled, waving to my friends with a big wide flashing grin on my porcelain face. Constance sighed as she walked up to the bleachers, which she normally did for my basketball practices and games. My friends turned to look at me, and then looked away, their faces a little mad. I blinked and then ran out to the track mile and run my lap. To tell you the truth, I was _slow_. It took me ten minutes to run the stupid thing because I was _slow_, that was why I was always the benchwarmer when we had basketball games.

"Alright, girls, we have our next game is down in Long Beach. Is anyone besides Miss Hooding not going to be there?" My coach, Mrs. Aiken asked. One of the girls in my grade, Naomi, raised her hand and told Mrs. Aiken that she was going to go to her sister's wedding up in L.A. and that she wouldn't be able to make the basketball game.

After basketball, I went up to Macy and asked her what was wrong with all of them; she just shook her head, telling me that it was nothing. I then went up to one of my most loyal friends, Violet, and asked her what was wrong.

"Well, Tragedy, we're all just a little sad that you're going to be leaving us here

in San Diego...and you still owe Brianna her $25." Violet said solemnly as she looked

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down to her white and black checkered tennis shoes.

I nodded my head, remembering the track match that I had lost to her. I met Brianna's emerald green opals, as she looked a little angry with me. I sighed sadly, as I looked away to the scenery around me. Constance ran down the bleachers, and sped past me to go to her class.

School started at 9:00 AM, and I went to my first class, Calculus. I took notes obediently as I understood what my teacher, Mr. Pascal. Afterwards, I went on with my normal routine of classes until lunch.

At our school, there were certain tables with certain cliques. My "clique" sat in the far left corner of the cafeteria. Some other boy friends sat with us too, like, Abel, Aedan, Jaden, and Mac. Aedan was lean, and had silky charcoal-black hair, he was also 5"9". Jaden, on the other hand, was built, and had pale blond hair that resembled prairie grass, and he was 6"1", and then there was Mac. Mac wasn't lean, and he wasn't built, he was somewhat in between. He had glossy black hair, similar to Aedan's, and Mac was 5"7".

Anyways, we all sat down at our usual table spot in the huge cafeteria. I had eight hundred twenty seven kids in my whole grade, just because there were so many people who liked living in sunny San Diego.

"...So today's the big day, isn't it?" I heard Mac ask me, everyone was abnormally quiet and silent today, and it was all because I was moving. I sighed and nodded my head as I held my head down as I ate my cheese pizza that we were having for lunch today. Luckily, Violet found something interesting to talk about, saying how her brother was going to the state spelling bee tournament.

Eventually school got out and I just sighed. Aedan, one of my closest guy friends, walked over to me and smiled, giving me one of those goodbye hugs. He was my closest, and the nicest guy friend I had. Jaden was ok, but he was a real jock, and Mac was well...quiet, but with Aedan, I could tell him about my problems (Even though he was a guy) and he would actually listen to me.

"We're going to miss you, Tradg." He said to me, he always called me "Tradg" because it was shorter than actually saying my name, it eliminated two letters, which probably didn't make too much of a difference.

"I'll miss you, Aedan."

"Remember to send postcards, and write to us." Aedan said to me with a grin. I nodded my head, waving to him as I ran to my Ferrari, with Constance waiting in the backseat, looking as bored as ever.

"Was that your _boyfriend_?" Constance asked with a giggle in her voice. My face morphed from ghostly pale, to a cherry-red. Why would my sister even _think_ that? She knew Aedan, hack, she even told me she had a little crush on her! So why would she think that Aedan and me were..._together_?

"Ew! Why would you even _think_ that? That was Aedan, dumb bell!" I yelled at her, and she just snickered, I was furious. However, I sped away at about fifty miles per hour.

The ride home was tranquil, and silent. Constance didn't speak about me having a boyfriend, actually, she didn't even talk at all...that was so unnatural for her. She

was always the bubbly one who filled ever millimeter of silence with chatter.

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When we arrived home, Mom and Dad were packing up, while Dominique was packing all the boxes into Dad's SUV. Constance and I walked over to my parents to help them pack, except after ten minutes of helping pack; Constance decided that she was too weak and young to help.

After an hour and a half of packing, we all piled into the SUV with Dad driving us to the airport with all of our things. I was going to miss San Diego, but I felt somehow relieved that I was leaving, but that reason was somewhat unknown to even me.

"You kids are going to _love _Anchorage! I lived there in my high school years." My father told us. Dominique was just looking out the window, bored, and I was looking out the other one, observing the life that was in there while Constance sat watching a _Barney _movie on our portable DVD player.

"...I heard it's like Antarctica." I retorted, and Dad shrugged his shoulders, looking at me from the rear view mirror.

"It's pretty hot during the summer, in fact; the summer up there gets twenty-four hour sunlight."

"And the winter?"

"Well, you won't need to worry about that. We packed plenty of winter clothes, and if we need to, we'll go buy some new ones, sound good?" I simply nodded my head with a soft sigh escaping my flawless cherry-red lips.

We got out of the SUV and took all of our stuff to the airport. We all managed to get to the right plane, although it was going to take off in about two hours, so we decided to go to the food court. Luckily, they had a Pizza Hut, so we all shared a medium cheese pizza, which soothed all of our hungers, unfortunately, eating only took us twenty minutes; we still had and hour and forty minutes until the plane took off.

My mother, Constance, and I walked to our seats in the waiting area while Dominique and my dad went to the men's restroom. I pulled out the book I was reading currently, which was about 481 pages long, and hardcover. My mom read a magazine while Constance continued to watch her video on the DVD player.

After two complete hours, we were set to leave. We gave the attendants our plane tickets, and they did a profile check on Constance to make sure she was really my mom's daughter. We walked on the plane, and I got the window seat while Dominique was right next to me.

"Are you scared of heights, Tragedy?" My brother asked me with a devilish grin on his immensely pale face. I shook my head, and he frowned with disappointment, obviously, he was trying to scare me...but...in reality, I _was _scared of heights, but why would I admit that to my brother?

The pilot instructed us over the intercom to have our seatbelts on and inform us that no smoking was permitted in the air flight, and then they walked us through on the procedure if there's a drop in air level and we need oxygen.

"I'm going to miss my friends..." I mumbled to myself, apparently, Dominique heard me and sighed, nodding his head in agreement.

"Yeah, but at least we can send postcards to them." He told me as he looked over me to

stare out the window.

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The flight was long, and boring. I ended up watching _Charlie's Angels _on the DVD player while Constance fell asleep in her seat next to Mom. I hadn't seen _Charlie's Angels _in almost forever. Dominique, on the other hand, was listening to his favorite band, _Papa Roach_, and allowing the music to blast through his headset.

"Dominique, turn it down, man." I said, slightly irritated that I was listening to his stupid music. He scowled at me for a moment with his inky black orbs, and then just ignored my request.

"Dominique, _please_! It's irritating!" I pleaded to him as I scowled with anger at him. Her looked at me with his dark, midnight orbs and snickered as he turned the volume down..._finally_.

I finished watching _Charlie's Angels_ and then decided to take a little catnap in my seat. With Dominique's music down, and the shade of the window down, I drifted into a vast sleep.

In my dream, I was in an unfamiliar forest, and all I could hear was the flapping of wings above me, although I knew it was a dream, I asked myself if I was dead...although that was almost an impasse with me and my consciousness.

In the lovely—or so it seemed like so far—dream, I leaning against a tree, placing a red rose with white splatters up to my nostrils, inhaling the wondrous floral scent that exhilarated from it. Then I felt something wet on my hand.

The flower was bleeding.

Yes, it was bleeding crimson blood, I dropped the flower, and within a split second, it vanished into thin air, becoming extinct from the face of the planet. It was quite strange, a beautiful rose bleeding in my touch.

Then, the flapping of wings appeared again and then—

I awoke with a gasp.

"Hey, are you ok?" I heard Dominique ask me as he noticed I was _very _pale. However, I did question myself exactly _why_ I was pale? The dream was _not _a nightmare, and not scary in any way that was possible, except for probably for the carmine blood...but blood was like oblivion to me, it never bothered me in any way.

"Yeah, just woke up." I replied, but it was still strange to see I was paler than usual. However, sadly, I was as pale as Dad, Dominique, and Constance now.

The rest of the flight was drawing random pictures in a spiral notebook that was an old science notebook when I was in middle school. My porcelain color returned to my face as my mind was concentrated on a picture in the magazine in the little packet. The picture was of trees and a river that looked almost like one of those famous Japanese gardens you see in movies.

"We are about to land, please buckle your seatbelts, and thank you for riding with us. We hope you have a nice day." I could hear the masculine voice on the speaker. It was the pilot telling us that we had to gather our things, shut our electronic devices off, and getting ready for a bumpy landing.

The plane landed and I looked outside my window at the slightly sunny and slightly cloudy sky. Not bad, actually. Dominique grinned at the sight of the clouds. Constance just pouted to herself because it wasn't quite sunny out.

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After the plane steered its way to the airport, and we remained seated until we were instructed to get our carry-on and leave.

It took them at least ten minutes until we were able to leave. I grabbed my backpack with all of my stuff, and Dominique walked out to the hallway and walked, I followed quietly behind him as we walked out of the airplane, and into the Anchorage airport in Alaska.

"Finally, we made it." I heard Dominique groan a little, Dominique hated airplanes. It wasn't the height that was the problem; it was the space in it. You see, Dominique is a little..._claustrophobic_. He hates tight spaces and being crammed in a little airplane bothers him, I like to make fun of him though.

"All right, is anyone hungry?" My mother asked us all; Constance nodded her head as she held her hand over her stomach as if she was starving. Dad just chuckled.

"Let's go get something to bite on, alright?" Dad said as he put Constance on his shoulders. Dominique just rolled his obsidian eyes and just followed behind my father. My mother walked beside me, her red raspberry lips twitching a warm smile at me as I looked at her with my fiery red eyes.

"What do you think so far?" She asked me. I just shrugged my shoulders and told her that it was all right. She just exposed her magnolia teeth to me, and they shimmered in the bright light like pearls. I returned her smile and we headed into a McDonald's.

This McDonald's was like most others. It was small, cheap, and filled with foods with enormous high calories. I just ordered a small order of fries with a Coke. Constance got a chicken nugget happy meal with a milk jug, while Dominique got a big Mac with a Diet Coke. Mom and Dad passed on the meal while we stuffed our faces like starving savages—no, starving _vultures_—was what we ate like.

"So, what school are we going to attend?" I asked my mother as I took a sip of my Coke.

"The local public school." My father replied before my mother could even open her mouth to speak. I just nodded my head. The last school we went to was a private school that Dominique and I loved a lot. I mean, there weren't a lot of kids that were in our grade since it was very costly to go there. So, there were about 60 kids—including Dominique and I—that were in our grade. In Constance's there was about 37 kids, and that included her. Now that we were going to a public school, there'd at least be about 300 kids in both our grades.

"So, why'd we move up here again?" Dominique asked, a little annoyed by the fact that his friends were probably hanging around the beach while he was in a winter wonderland.

"Well, our family originated here, and the wildlife here is just _fantastic_, and we can get a lot more money with our work here, and the hospitals pay a lot! I bet that these folks would just _love _to hear my songs too!" My mother said cheerfully with full enthusiasm and optimism.

"Mommy, what does our new house look like?" Constance asked with curiosity filling her high-pitched, melodic voice. Mom gave a small chuckle as she gave a happy grin, running her porcelain fingers through my sister's raven-black hair as she explained that our house was a few miles away from the airport.

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After a quick meal at McDonald's, we grabbed our carry-on and then got our luggage. We took a bus to downtown Anchorage where we got a slight tour of the city. Then, we were dropped off to the far edge of downtown, where we had to walk the rest of the mile.

"This is _boring_." I heard my sister complain while Dominique carried her on his shoulders. I laughed and just smiled to my sister lovingly. Constance and I barely ever fought. The person I mostly fought with was Dominique, and that was because he was just a stubborn brother who was three minutes older that me. I occasionally fought with my mother, but that was a pretty rare occasion to happen. Dad and I never fought. _Never_. I can't think of _one _time that I actually fought with Storm Vernon Hooding.

About a half-hour later, we arrived at a household that resembled a dream house. It was large. _Very _large, and was the color of snow. Snow…that wet stuff that you see in movies all the time. I don't think I ever remember actually seeing snow in real life.

"Look at that!" I heard Mom yell out. It had gates and topiary in the front yard—well, it was more of _meadow_ than an actual _yard_—but it was still magnificent.

"I wonder what the inside looks like." I stated. We pressed a button that mad a buzz. My father somehow managed to open the gates and we walked in with our entire luggage.

The inside was more breath taking than the outside. Marble steps with a long carmine rug in the middle of the gorgeous marble steps. Two marble statues of lions were placed in front of the banisters. There was a lion statue in front of the right banister, the other one in front of the left banister. A large chandelier was right above us as the diamonds and crystals glistening more beautifully than ever. At the top of the steps was two wings; the east and west wings. On the plane, Mom informed me that I was staying in a room all by myself in the east wing while Constance had a room next to mine, and Dominique across from me. Mom and Dad had their bedroom in the west wing.

"This place is _huge_!" Dominique yelled out. I swear that I heard an echo after he yelled. We all laughed when we heard my brother's echo as we took our own luggage up the stairs.

I opened the door to my room, and saw a white bed with a lovely magnolia-white canopy. I had a vanity with a mirror and a balcony that showed a forest, lake, and mountains in the horizon. Below my balcony was a large outdoor pool with a diving board. This place was too much of a fantasy to be reality because this was a dream come true. Our old house in San Diego was just a three-story building with a one-door garage. It was nice, I had to agree, but this place was much nicer.

I dropped my bags and suitcases on the ground and looked to the floor to see it was carpet that was as white as pearls on a shoreline. I ran out of my room to check out the rest of the family's rooms.

First was Constance's. I opened her door to see her room was a light carnation pink color. Her room didn't have a balcony, probably because Mother and Father wouldn't approve, afraid she might fall off it and break her head open or fracture a bone.

"Your room's so neat, Constance!" I exclaimed happily with a grin.

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"Yeah!" She yelled with a giggle as she jumped on her bed, which had a comforter with flower embroidery on it. I lie down on her flowery bed, and felt instant comfort, as if I did not want to get out of the soft bed.

"Tragedy! Get off my bed!" Constance giggled as she tried to push me off her bed, which surprisingly, was a simple task for her. Since when had my six-year old sister been able to push a 130-pound sister off her bed?

I ignored the question and got up off the magnolia-white carpet with a laugh. I waved my sister goodbye as I walked out of her room and walked into Dominique's.

Dominique's room was pained with flames. Flames everywhere you looked. Dominique was lying on his bed when I walked in, tossing a basketball towards the ceiling. The walls were black like death, and then fire flames everywhere.

"What are you doing in here?" Dominique hissed to me with venom. He gave me a small glare with his obsidian-black eyes. I cowered back out to the hallway, shutting the door behind me as I did so.

I walked into the west wing, seeing portraits of knights and medieval times. I knocked on my parent's door and they allowed me to come in. Their room was green with a white bed. Tranquil, some how. It seemed like a garden in here with all the lush green plants and flowers…

"Hello, darling." My mother said to me with a warm smile, while Dad was packing the clothes away. Like Constance and Dominique, this room did not have a balcony.

"Hi Mom, hi Dad." I said a little tentatively. I looked around more, and then decided to check out the backyard.

I ran down the marble stairs and then ran out the doors to the backyard. The grass was lush green, like my parent's bedroom, and soft like my pearly-white carpet. I laid down in the grass, until I realized I was unconscious and drifted to a deep sleep.

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	2. Chapter 2

II. Sapphire 

In my dream, I was in the middle of nowhere. Nothing in sight except for the sand and I. The sky was also there, cotton candy clouds flowing above me. The serpent from the Eden garden slithered up my leg, my chest, and then on my shoulder. It frightened me at first, but then I tentatively asked the snake why he was here.

Although I knew it was a dream, it for some reason, I made myself believe that it was real. It felt like a fantasy world, but then it felt like reality all at the same time. I know it sounds confusing, but it feels like a mixture between a fantasy and reality.

"I have been looking for you everywhere." The serpent hissed to me, which made me shiver slightly. I just nodded my head, waiting to see what this serpent had in store next.

"Why have you been looking for me?" I asked curiously. The serpent made some sort of a hissing laugh. It frightened me still, because I had a fear of snakes.

"Sweetheart, I have been waiting you for some time. It is time you—"

"It's raining!" I exclaimed, for it was starting to drench the creature and I.

Then, suddenly, I awoke with a fright. My clothes were covered in icy cold water, and surrounding me was Mom, Dad, Constance, and Dominique. Dominique was snickering as he held a bucket. He was the one who had dumped the water over me. That meant that the water in my dream that felt so real, _was _real.

"Dear, are you ok?" Mother asked me, as Dad looked worried. Constance was giggling and Dominique continued to snicker. I sent a cold glare to him and he made a face at me. Though, I decided to answer Mom's question and nod.

"What happened?" I asked, wondering if anything happened to me.

"Well, you fell asleep. I think you've been sleeping for what? Hour or so? Anyway, we were worried about you." My dad explained to me. I blinked my fire opals as I sighed.

"I have to go change, sorry." I concluded, standing up. I limped over to the door, I must have slept on top of my leg, but the dream was so obscure, like fog. What was my time and why did the devilish snake want to talk to me so much? To force me to temptation like with Adam and Eve? So many questions, too little time to answer them all.

I ran up to my room and closed the curtains to the balcony, and then undressed. I grabbed a royal blue shirt that said "Splash" on it. It had a sequence picture of a fish, the fish from the famous book, "The Rainbow Fish". It was one of my favorite shirts because the fish's story was so interesting to me for some reason. Don't ask me why, but I just adored that book.

I then changed into new jeans as I then thought of something out of the blue. Were the kids going to accept me as their friends at this new public school? Were they

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going to reject me because of how I looked? What about Constance? When she started kindergarten, the children did not like her because she had black eyes and charcoal-black hair. I did not want her to suffer the same fate here. Being the outcast was _not _fun. I had suffered it when I first started middle school, and it was terrible. Dominique had no problem, because the guys weren't as nasty as the girls.

I sighed, and finished changing my clothes. I walked out of my bedroom and walked to the top of the steps, where I slid down the banister until the end where I jumped off before I ran into the lion statue.

When I grabbed my shoes on I yelled to Mother that I was going to go check the place out. She told me that it was ok, and Dominique said he was too bored to stay here and that he was coming along. Dominique and I were walking out of out house—more of a mansion—and we walked past the gates.

"What's there for fun here?" He asked me as I shrugged my shoulders.

"How the heck should I know?" I asked him that had a hint of venom in my voice, Dominique ignored it however.

Both of us walked side by side, as I could see couples pointing at us. Dominique ignored it, and flashed glares to them, while I just shook my head in disappointment. Dominique may be three minutes older than I might be, but that doesn't mean he has to fight my battles; I could fight my own battles.

We continued to walk until we saw what school we had to go. It was big. _Huge_. A bald eagle was painted on one of the walls.

"Um, wow. This place is big." Dominique said, bombarded with surprise by the bigness of the school.

"Well it _is _a public school. Lots of kids go here of course." I said, trying to make him acknowledge my I.Q... although, sadly, it did not work.

"I know that, I just mean it's probably bigger than our house." He said, staring at the symbolic eagle on the wall.

"No _really_? I _never knew_!" I snickered, teasing him as he gave me a blank glare with his empty obsidian eyes...wait. _Empty_? Since when were his eyes ever _empty_? It was a little strange, although I quickly ignored it.

"So, want to go check some other places out?" I asked him, he shook his head, and told me that he was getting tired, and was ready to go to bed.

"Seriously?" I asked.

"Seriously, carrying Constance and luggage at the same time gets very tiring."

"All right then..." I said, and we both began to walk to the same destination spot: home.

"Dominique..."

"Yeah?" He answered, acknowledging the fact that I actually existed and talked.

"Do you think we're going to like it here?"

He didn't respond to that one, unfortunately.

"Do you think that Constance is going to make friends here?" I asked, worried for my sister's sake. Constance was a kind and loving girl who just wanted to be accepted by her friends and not made fun of. Dominique and I got annoyed when the mean kids would pick on her.

"Probably, I mean, did you see all the kids in her grade? There's bound to be at

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least _one _kid that would be her friend." He said, looking up at the darkening sky, and then looked at his watch.

"What time is it?" I asked, wondering if Mom would have dinner ready when we got back.

"Quarter to seven." He said with no expression in his voice whatsoever.

"Mom should have dinner ready by now, we'd better hurry." I started running, and Dominique caught up to me, and then outran me to the gates. I stuck my tongue out in losing while he praised his victory.

Dominique and I walked through the gates as we strode towards the house. Well, actually, I just frolicked like my usual self as my twin laughed at me as I humiliated myself, but I could have cared less, I was having fun.

"Hey look! It's a Tinkerbelle!" Dominique called to me as I continued to frolic.

"Tinkerbelle doesn't frolic, idiot." I told him with a sharp tongue. He made a "psh" noise as I told him about the frolicking. We opened the front door and walked in; taking off our shoes as I could smell Mom's famous mashed potatoes.

"Yum, mashed potatoes." Dominique said with sarcasm in his voice. He hated stuff that wasn't meat. I mean, it would not _kill _him, he just preferred meat to anything else. Although, once we walked in, Dominique's eyes lit up as he saw a big steak in the middle of the dinning room table.

"Ok, maybe this dinner won't completely suck." He said as he sat down, staring at the huge steak on the ivory white hotplate. I sat across from my twin as we stared at all the food on the table: a big steak, a bowl of mashed potatoes, another plate of breadsticks, and bowl of copper gravy. We hadn't had a meal like this in ages, and I was sure ready for a good meal like this.

"Oh does that sure smell good!" I heard my father exclaim as he walked—or rather jogged—down the stairs as he walked straight into the dinning room and sat right next to me as Mother walked in with a warm smile.

"I hope you guys like it, and you better eat it all."

"Or what?" Dominique teased with a snicker.

"Or you'll be held back at school." Mom raised an eyebrow at him and Dominique looked completely confused as I started laughing.

"You can't hold me back!"

"Oh yes I can. I can have the principal hold you back for a year."

"But what about hot chicks? They'll think I'm a loser!" Dominique complained as Dad stood up and walked over to him, whispering loud enough in his ear for everyone to hear.

"She was just joking, sport. Where's Constance at?" My dad asked my mom, although it sounded like a question directed to everyone.

"She's sleeping in her room right now. Don't wake her up." My mother said to everyone, as she sat down next to Dominique.

We prayed for about a minute or so, and then we dug into our food. I grabbed a plateful of mashed potatoes and breadsticks as Dominique and Dad split the steak half-and-half.

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"Wow Mom, this is a really good meal!" I told her as I scooped my fork into my butter-filled potatoes and swerved it into my mouth with the desire to taste the wonderful food.

"Thanks, dear." She told me as I continued to eat. Dominique was just scarfing down his steak as if he was starving and the food was the only way of survival. Mom, Dad, and I finished the potatoes while Dominique eventually finished his steak, and I ate the rest of the breadsticks.

"That was probably the best meal I have eaten in my entire life." Dominique said as he said back in his chair, holding his belly. I leaned back also, completely stuffed. If I had eaten another bite, I would have literally vomited, and I did _not _want that to happen.

"Yeah, it was so good! I can't eat anything else or I will seriously puke." I told my mom as I stood up and stumbled out of the kitchen as if I was wasted or something like that.

"You need to go to the bathroom?" Father asked me as he arched an eyebrow. I turned back and shook my head as I tiredly walked up the stairs, walking over to the east wing where my room was.

I opened my door to see that the glistening silver moonlight was shining beautifully from my balcony. The jewel starts shimmered with radiance, but not as beautiful as the moon did.

I closed the curtains for a moment to change into my pajamas, and then opened them up, allowing light to come into my dark room. I lie down on my bed, feeling the pulse of comfort wash over my body, and then found myself drifting into a dream.

Wings. I had wings in my dream, as if I was a celestial angel sent from Heaven, except that they were charcoal-black instead of the pearly white you always imagine. My hair was still a fiery red color, and the same with my eyes. In the dream, however, dead bodies surrounded me that were drenched in crimson blood. Did they die because of me?

"So, have you finished?" A dark, mysterious voice questioned me in the dream. Sadly, though, I couldn't tell if the gender was feminine or masculine.

"Yes, they're all dead." I said. The girl in my dream was indeed me, but in my knowing of what was happening, I was clueless...I just let my dream go by.

"Excellent. Now, along with the plans—,"

"But what about the—,"

I had woken up from my dream at about 6:47 A.M. Although the dream was short, I had slept for almost eleven hours.

I sat up to see that it was very cloudy out. I turned the T.V. on that was in my bedroom, and saw that the forecast today was mostly cloudy and a chance of rain. I sighed; rain was the last thing I needed. I was supposed to be starting school today, and my day was destroyed by the weather.

I grabbed some camouflage jeans and a white American flag T-shirt. I was in the mood to be wearing army clothes, so I did. I walked out of my room and into the hallway where I went into the bathroom. I brushed my teeth, washed my face, and brushed my hair out and placed my fiery hair into a bun.

I ran down the marble steps as I saw that my backpack filled with supplies this morning. Someone must have filled it while I was sleeping, but whom? Oh, it didn't matter, I had to get to school.

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I then realized that it was only 6:57, and school didn't start until 8:00. I still had time. I decided that I'd take a stroll in the backyard, enjoy the scenery. Although it looked utterly sad in the backyard thanks to the clouds, I enjoyed seeing the rose garden and the lake. I saw that there was a rather large forest about one-hundred yards from the house. Going into the forest, wouldn't do any damage...would it?

I then decided no, I wasn't going to go. I would probably end up getting lost and miss school. That would be terrible, and maybe I would start out with a bad reputation, and I was _not _ready for that to happen...yet.

I felt splats of water fell down from the sky. It felt as if my skin was on fire as they landed on my porcelain skin. I hurried inside, seeing now that it was 7:03. Great, what was I going to do for fifty-seven—now fifty-six—minutes?

Constance came down the stairs, rubbing her obsidian eyes as she yawned, which caused my to yawn. I waved to her and smiled.

"Hey, morning Constance."

"Nnn...morning..." She said as she slouched down the stairs, into the kitchen, and grabbed herself a bowl of Fruity Pebbles. I couldn't help but chuckle. Constance had never been a morning person, actually, _none _of had, especially Dominique. Mom came down the stairs in her work clothes—that consisted of a plain lavender T-shirt with jeans, and black boots—and waved to me.

"Hey, sweetheart, can you do a favor and wake your brother up?" She asked as she rushed past me as I was waiting by the lion statue. I shrugged my shoulders, and told her I was fine with that. _Yeah right. He will be so pissed at me_ I thought to myself as I climbed the large ivory white marble steps. Dominique despised anyone who awoke him from his slumber.

I walked over to Dominique's door and opened it, to see him sprawled over the queen-sized bed, sleeping, drooling, and snoring.

"Hey Dom! Wake up, idiot!" I yelled at him, he turned and ignored me. I growled lowly at him as I stomped in his room. He wore no shirt and had some boxer shorts on which was completely normal for him to sleep in.

"You fricken' idiot! Wake up or else I'll pour cold water on you!" He ignored me, but I was serious. Ha, he wouldn't realize not to mess with me...just wait. I ran out of the room, snickering as I grabbed a bowl from the kitchen, placed ice cubes inside it, and poured cold water in it. I then rushed up the stairs without spilling, ran to Dominique's room, and poured it all over his body. He sat up with the girlish scream I have ever heard in my seventeen-year life.

"You girly man! Finally you wake up!" I yelled as I laughed hard. He glared at me with his rock-hard eyes. He was furious.

"If I die of hyperthermia, I'm blaming it on you." He said to me coldly. Hyperthermia? Ha! You couldn't catch that unless you were in freezing cold, which in Alaska's winters, would probably be easy.

"If you died you wouldn't be able to do anything, loser!" I yelled, trying to hold back my laughter, which was a surprise since it actually worked.

"So what? I'd haunt you in your sleep!" He said as he got up from his bed and looked at me, and I just laughed as I walked out of his bedroom. He shut the door after I walked out, and I looked at my watch, it was 7: 07.

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I walked down the steps, groaning as the time moved as slowly as ever. When was time ever going to speed up? Well, then again, I didn't want to become _old _lie elderly old, but I just wanted the time to hurry up so I could go to school already.

I leaned my head against the clarity windows, staring at the darkening sky as Constance ate her cereal. Dominique came down with a white T-shirt that had an image of a dragon on it, and then wore cerulean jeans. He came down the stairs, his charcoal hair still wet from the surprise I gave him. He gave me a death glare with his cold coal eyes. He brushed past me and grabbed Constance's box of Fruity Pebbles.

"Hey! I was looking at that!" Constance whined as she tried to grab the box out of my twin's hands.

"I don't give a crap." He said icily. Since when was he that cranky to be mean to his youngest sister? Did that water treatment I gave him really tick him _that _much?

"Hey, Dom, what's up?" I asked a little mad. How dare he be mean to Constance? For Christ's sake, he was supposed to _watch _out for her! Not _hurt _her!

"I'm in a bad mood, now shut up and leave me alone."

I glared at Dominique as I watched him eat his Fruity Pebbles. He was such a low-life, yelling at his kid-sister! It was strange though, how his obsidian eyes were pure fury, and how his voice filled with so much growl and anger. He never acted that way...at least, not that I've seen.

Now it was about 7:13. This was going to be a long morning I knew. I saw Dominique finish and toss the box to Constance.

"Here." He muttered to her, Constance started to whine.

"You ate it all!" She shrieked as she pouted. I walked over to her and patted her back, trying to make her feel better.

"It's ok, Constance. Dom's in a bad mood today." I told her with soft "shh"s as clarity tear droplets fell from her onyx eyes. Dominique brushed past me with a grunt as I watched him stomp up the ivory marble steps with irritation. What had gotten into him?

"Hey, Constance, what's the date, do you know?" I asked curiously. I had forgotten what the date was today.

"August 28th...why?" She asked curiously, her obsidian eyes outlined with crimson from the tears. I froze in shock. Today was Dominique and my eighteenth birthday.

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	3. Chapter 3

III. Onyx

Today Dominique and I were officially eighteen. Why was the knowledge of his birthday today making him so terribly mad though? Maybe he was just irritated that this was our last year in high school...? I sighed, knowing that the idea was pretty stupid. Who _wouldn't _love having their birthday? Okay, maybe not _everyone _since the idea of getting older was a scary thought.

I shrugged the thought off my shoulders, and felt pretty good that today I was officially eighteen. I looked at the time. It was 7:32. Ah! What was I going to do with myself? I sighed angrily, feeling my face burn with fury while my impatience swooshed over me with the waves of irritation. I was simply not patient, that was a quality I had unfortunately gotten from my father.

"Tragedy, c'mon, we'll be late for school." I heard Dominique say to me in an aggravated tone. Late? Ha, yeah right!

"How the heck are we going to be late?" I asked, questioning him.

"They changed the time of school. It starts at about 7:40 now."

"_WHAT_?" I said, bewildered by this sudden fact. I grabbed my stuff and stormed out of the room before Dominique could even say anything else. Behind me, I could see Dominique walking with Constance behind him. A hard scowl molded on Dominique's pale white face, but an uneasy feeling filled Constance's pretty face.

"Come on you slowpokes!" I shouted to them with a giggle in my voice. Dominique glared at me while Constance ran over, laughing freely. She hopped on my back as I gasped from the sudden attack. We both started giggling of course, but Dominique caught up to our pace, his atmosphere saying something like "Leave me alone or die."

Eventually, we made it to school. Hundreds of people lined up to walk inside the doors of the school, including Dominique, Constance, and me. Of course, Constance ran off to her age group while Dominique and I were with the seniors. There were lots and lots of girls, but there were plenty of guys too.

I noticed this one girl with metallic silver hair. It was so pretty how it shined in the light, that I was almost dazzled by the majority of beauty that shone from her metallic hairstyle. I also had noticed that the silver-haired female also had eyes that were as grey as onyx.

Dominique and I walked to our first class, which happened to be English with Mr. Webster. Mr. Webster was lean, and tall. He had butterscotch hair that was trimmed nicely, which made him look like he was at least twenty-five years of age. He had the dreamy cerulean eyes that made him handsome.

"Hello, class." He addressed us as we took our seats. I sat in the front center, with Dominique three seats behind me. I noticed the onyx-grey eyed female was right behind

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me. She was very pretty, for a girl I mean. Her silver hair brushed her cheeks with elegance as it slid in front and behind her back. She wore a black turtleneck with long blue jeans.

"We have two new students joining us this year. Dominique? Tragedy?" He said as he eyed my twin and me with his sapphire eyes. I groaned the last thing I wanted was to stand in front of the whole class and introduce myself. However, Dominique and I walked up, both leaning our backs on the white board.

"Name's Dominique. Got a problem with that? I'll break your neck." My brother said with icy venom filling up his rose tongue.

"I'm Tragedy. Forgive my brother, he can get cranky sometimes." I said with an apologetic smile that I hoped would allow them to forgive my brother.

"Whoa! They're twins!" I heard a boy shout. I sighed, well of course we were.

"Yes, we are." I answered for him with not much emotion in my voice.

"They don't look alike though..." I heard a girl say softly.

"True, but we're still twins. Born at the same time." I said.

"Actually, I'm three minutes older." Dominique corrected as I rolled my sunset eyes. I sighed as we both walked back to our desks. When I sat down, and Mr. Webster began to talk about indenting paragraphs and stuff, I felt someone poke me in the back with a pencil, or was it a pen? I turned around and the silver-haired female handed me a note. I opened it.

Name is Veronica Reeling. Want to sit with my friends and me at lunch? We will be sitting in the center of the cafeteria.

I turned back to the female and nodded with a smile. Maybe this new high school wouldn't be so bad after all.

At lunch, I spotted the silver-haired female known as Veronica Reeling, and decided to sit with her and her friends. They were different. One girl was about 5'5 and had short black hair with fuchsia highlights; she was obviously going for the emo look. Another girl had long, dark brown hair that ran down her back like a chocolate waterfall. She had brilliant blue eyes, carnation-pink lips, and looked about 5'7. Another female had blond ponytails and lots of makeup on. She was one of those girls, who could be seen with bubblegum popping from her lips, she looked like a cheerleader-type girl, and she was probably about 5'6.

"Look! New kid!" The emo-looking girl said. She had an alto voice, slightly deep, but not like a man's voice or anything. I blushed a light rosette color and sat down next to the bubblegum girl.

"Hi." I said tentatively while looking around shyly with a touch of nervousness.

"I'm Chalice Ridgeway." The emo-looking female introduced herself. I smiled and nodded, flashing my perfectly ivory teeth. The chocolate-brown haired female looked at me with a soft smile.

"My name is Rynn Quinney. It's a pleasure, Tragedy." Her voice was so loving, sweet, and kind. I also noticed that Rynn was British. I nodded, and looked towards my neighbor, the bubblegum girl.

"Hi! I'm Jarissa Drexel! It's so nice to meet you!" She exclaimed. She was

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_exactly _how I imagined her. The high-pitched "squeal" with the completely preppy look.

"And you know that I'm Veronica Reeling." Veronica spoke to me with an authority, and woman-like tone. I nodded my head with a smile.

"It's nice to meet you guys too. Tragedy Hooding is my name." I said with a warm grin. I glanced over to see Dominique unhappily sit with a group of guys. Why couldn't he just be Mr. Sunshine just for today?

"So, Tragedy was it? Anyways, where're you from?" Chalice asked me with a raised eyebrow.

"Oh, San Diego." I said blankly, answering her question. Jarissa squealed.

"Oh! California! Where the celebrities are!" She giggled as she shot her fists up in the air like she won the lottery or something.

"Well, that's more in L.A. and Hollywood instead of San Diego, but yeah, San Diego's in California. Unfortunately, I never get tan, neither does my family." I said with a nervous chuckle.

"Yes, I know exactly how you feel, Tragedy. My family never gets tan either." Rynn said with her loving British accent. She smiled warmly at me with her carmine lips as I nodded my head in response.

"Rynn, where are you from? Your accent is British..." I asked, and she smiled back at me, once again.

"I am from Juneau. My parents were born in Carlisle, England. They moved to Juneau when my mother became pregnant with me. After I was three, I moved to Anchorage." She said with elegance as the words rolled off her tongue like boulders in a rockslide.

"I see. Where are you guys from?" I gestured towards Chalice, Jarissa, and Veronica. Chalice was the first one to speak.

"I was born in Transylvania, but moved to Anchorage when I was two." She said with slight boredom in her voice.

"I'm originally from here!" I heard Jarissa cheer. Her voice was still high-pitched, almost like a screech or scream.

"...I was also born in Anchorage." Veronica concluded. It was quite interesting where everyone was from. Rynn was from England, Chalice from Romania, Jarissa, and Veronica from Alaska.

"...Are you going to eat that?" I heard Jarissa chirp to me in question form. I looked down to see that my cheese pizza was not touched, but I nodded my head, indicating to her that I was going to eat it.

"So, Tragedy, you have not told us about your life." Rynn said to me in a curious tone. I could see all eyes on me. I noticed something about everyone's eyes and lips, their eyes were silver like Veronica's, and their lips were as red as Rynn's, a carmine color.

"Well, I was born in San Diego. I have a twin brother named Dominique and a little sister named Constance. My full name is Tragedy Eclipse Hooding. I'm the only one in the family who looks like Mom. My brother and sister look like my dad. My mother's Italian while my dad is French." I told them while taking quick breaths after each very long sentence. I took a bite out of my pizza, and took a sip of my milk. From the corner of my eyes, I could see Dominique giving me a deathly glare. He was sitting with a bunch of other boys, and a couple of girls.

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"Oh! Look at that hot guy over there! He's staring at Tragedy!" Jarissa yelled, she wasn't in any of my classes, so she had no idea who my brother was, and the person she was talking about was...Dominique.

"He must have a crush on you!" She cheered. Veronica started laughing as I blinked in confusion.

"...Jarissa, that's my twin brother, Dominique." I stated as I started to giggle a little bit. Chalice and Rynn stared at Jarissa, and then we all broke out into laughs. I saw Dominique look away, and start talking to his new friends.

The bell rang, and Veronica, Jarissa, Rynn, Chalice, and me picked our trays up and walked to the trashcan to dump our food. I saw Jarissa giggle when Dominique walked past her. I rolled my eyes a bit and chuckled.

"Hey, Hooding, that your girlfriend?" I heard a boy about our age ask Dominique. He was questioning on whether Jarissa and Dom were going out. Which was strange because first of all, this was our first day at school! Second was that, Dominique didn't even _know _Jarissa! Dominique grabbed the kid by the collar of the shirt, and threw him across the lunchroom, and the boy slammed into the wall, causing a hole to form.

"Dom! Stop it!" I yelled loudly, he turned to me and gave a silent glare. He just walked off afterward. Jarissa hid behind me, looking frightened.

"Tragedy! Your brother's scary!" She screeched. Chalice started laughing, while Rynn and Veronica elbowed her. Chalice immediately stopped. All the teachers and other students stared at me which suspicion in their eyes.

"...He's been having a bad day lately..." I whispered softly with a sigh. How could an eighteen-year old kid whose hardly in any sports and doesn't work out, pick a 160-pound kid and throw him on the other side of the wall and cause a hole? It was confusing, heck, _today _was confusing. First the bad mood, then the glares, now _this_? I would have to ask him what was wrong, but then again, last time I asked, he didn't tell me anything.

I went on the rest of my classes, and thankfully, I didn't have to introduce myself in any of those classes. School ended and I waited outside for Constance and Dominique. When I got outside, I saw Constance on Dominique's shoulders, grinning as she saw the world around her. I walked over to them with a kind smile.

"Hey! You guys ready?" I asked, wondering if they were ready to go home. Constance nodded, but Dominique shook his head with a scowl. I blinked, wondering why he wasn't ready to go home yet. He read my expression, and began to speak to me and explain.

"My friend, Locke Marcus, is taking me to his house. He got a PS3 for his eighteenth birthday and he invited me to come over. I'll be back at around five." He said blankly, his voice deep and dull. He pointed to the guy who must have been Locke. Locke had obsidian-black hair and sapphire eyes. He was standing next to Chalice.

"Is Chalice Ridgeway Locke's girlfriend?" I asked curiously, wondering if maybe they were going out, I mean, they both had the same kind of look. Dominique shook his head.

"No, they're cousins. Locke and Chalice live next to each other so they carpool." I nodded, understanding now. Locke and Chalice did look alike, with the black hair and all. I saw Locke walk over to Dominique, grinning a bit.

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"Hey there, man! Ready to go play some video games?" He asked. He sounded a bit like what a jock would sound like. You know the ones in the movies. Chalice was beside Locke, smirking at me with her metallic eyes.

"Yeah, Marcus, you're on!" Dominique yelled enthusiastically, Constance giggled. Chalice bent down to her and smiled, then glanced up at me.

"Is this your sister?" She asked, poking my sister's nose. Constance just giggled as I nodded with a chuckle.

"Yeah, she is. That's Constance, and then there's my bro, Dominique." I introduced my brother and sister. Chalice nodded and giggled at Constance and held her hand out to her.

"Nice to meet ya, Constance. Name's Chalice, I'm one of Tragedy's friends." Chalice smiled at Constance. Constance shook her hand and grinned.

"See ya, Trag, Con; I'm going with Locke now." Dominique stated as he grinned at Locke, who seemed to be grinning back. I looked at Chalice, who got the same idea as I did.

"Hey, Locke, I'm goin' to Tragedy's house, you ok with that?" Chalice asked, and I saw Locke nod his head. Constance cheered, and I grinned.

"'Kay you guys! See ya!" Locke yelled as he and Dominique raced to Locke's grey Chevrolet Silverado. Chalice started looking around for my car.

"Hey, where'd you park your hot rod at?" Chalice asked, still looking around. I chuckled softly as I held onto Constance's hand.

"We walked to school. Our house is like two blocks away from here." I told her, she blinked. Chalice sighed while rolling her onyx eyes.

"Fine, whatever. Let's just get going."

Chalice, Constance, and I walked the two blocks to my house. It felt like forever since Chalice was raving about how school sucked and how much homework we were piled with for the weekend. It was a little annoying to listen to her complains. Though, I somehow managed to live through that. Constance cheered about her first day, which made Chalice and I laugh a little. Chalice was amazed by how excited and happy my sister was all the time, she even said it was almost _sickening_ to see how happy she was.

When we walk inside my house—or rather mansion—I took Chalice to my room. She blinked, around at all the bright colors. I could tell she was slightly disgusted by the bright colors...but then I found out she was wrong.

"Sweet colors." She said with an impressed tone. I nodded my head, and she sat on my bed, running the palm of her hand on the comforter. "Is your sis ever sad?" She asked.

"Occasionally, but most of the time she isn't. She's mostly a cheery kid like you saw on the walk home." I responded to her question in an emotion-less tone; dull; bland; vacant.

"So, Chalice, what do you like to do in your free time?" I asked, curious. I was guessing that she was probably one of the drug-addicts that's always by a brick corner of a building, smoking.

"I usually sit on the roof and watch the world and sky go by. You're probably thinking that I look way to tough to do sissy stuff like that, but seriously, I like staring up at the sky, especially at night. When the stars come out, and the silver moonlight come

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out to greet us. It's such a beautiful sight to see."

"Don't take this badly, but I thought you'd be a druggie." I said, curious once again. To my surprise, she just laughed.

"Don't worry, Newbie. I hear that all the time from people. Even the cops suspected me of drugs, but I told 'em I was clean, and they even had to check to make sure. It was hilarious, really. Just 'because I look emo, doesn't mean I am. I guess the saying 'looks can be deceiving' really is true, isn't it?"

"Yeah."

"So, Newbie—,"

"Don't call me that!" I shouted, interrupting her. She started to laugh so hard at that. She shook her head, as if she was disappointed in me.

"All right _Tragedy_, what do _you _like to do in your free time?" She asked me. She arched an eyebrow, and I had to think for a moment.

"I like long walks on the beach during the summer sunset and—,"

"I was serious, not joking around." She said to me a little sternly. Her face was a small scowl but I chuckled and shook my head.

"Well, in San Diego I did that all the time, no joke. Anyways, I also like to read a lot. Do community service—,"

"Whoa! Community service! That's weird!" She shouted out loud, laughing a bit too.

"...Well, I have nothing else to do in my free time." I told her, scowling a bit at her. She smirked at me.

"You can sit on the roof and watch the world go by."

"...I'm scared of heights." I admitted to her, looking down. She blinked, and laughed a little more. We continued talking about school, what was the latest fad, boys, and lots of other cool stuff.

Chalice and I stayed in my room for hours, until my parents came home. Chalice decided to sneak out of my house without them knowing, because she had a reputation of being a drug-addict—which she was _not _because she was the total opposite; she hated drugs—but she wouldn't listen to me, she just walked out on the balcony, and perched on the rail.

"Chalice, you don't have to sneak out." I said told her. Chalice was becoming my

best friend, I didn't want her to leave just because my parents came home! She shook her head and glanced at me from the corner of her onyx eyes. A sly smile crept up on her Venetian-red lips and she winked to me.

"Your parents wouldn't want me to be here if they knew I was here, trust me on this one, Tragedy."

I sighed, and nodded my head. I made a gesture for her to go, but then an idea came to my head.

"Is it really safe for you to jump off? This _is _the second story. Couldn't you—," She had jumped off the railing before I could even finish what I was going to say to her. I gasped, and ran to the railing to see she landed on both feet, unharmed. She looked up at me and waved. I waved back, bewildered.

"H-How...?" I asked, but she smirked, placing her index finger to her carmine

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lips. She sped off faster than a cheetah could sprint in hunting season. I placed my hand on my forehead. Ok, how was it possible for a human girl to jump off the second story, land on her feet, and be completely _fine_? My mother's voice interrupted my reverie.

"Tragedy, dear!" I heard her yell. I took one more glance out the window, and Chalice was gone and out of sight. I made a small quiver, feeling a shiver gone down my curved spine.

Oh wait, I forgot to tell you I had Scoliosis, a spine curvature. Well, apparently, I was born with it. Mostly girls get it, but all it is a permanent spine curvature that I have to live with. It doesn't hurt, really, I even forget I have it. The curvature is about at thirteen degrees, which seriously isn't bad. If it was twenty and above, it'd be pretty bad, and even dangerous...sometimes life-threatening if it gets in the high forties.

Anyways, I ran down the marble steps to see Mom piled with groceries. I gasped, running over to her to help her with the plastic bags. I looked to see my mom had bought me Oreos, and she bought Dominique his beef jerky. Constance got her Twix. I also saw what was for dinner tonight: fruit salad, macaroni and cheese, and a New York steak.

"Hey Mom? Have you noticed Dominique's been acting um—," I thought hard about what word to use. I carefully carved the word with my lips. "—Strange?"

"Speaking of Dominique, where is he?" She asked. I could tell she was avoiding the subject, but why would my own mother avoid that subject?

"He's at a friend's house; I think the guy's name was Locke Marcus?" I reported to her with an uneasy smile. Chalice had told me that my mother wouldn't like her to be at my house. I wanted to know if maybe Locke wasn't able to come over...not that I _wanted _him to come over, but just for Dominique's sake.

My mother smiled softly and nodded her head. "Oh, I see. The Marcus family is such a nice family." She said. I was surprised at first, but then I remembered that Chalice was only _cousins _with Locke.

"Hey, Mom, I made some new friends today." I told her, grinning. She arched an eyebrow at me and looked at me.

"That's great, Tragedy. What's their names?" She asked. I pondered for a moment, thinking if it was ok or not to give their names, but I did anyway.

"Veronica Reeling, Rynn Quinney, Jarissa Drexel, and Chalice Ridgeway." I told their names, my lips carving each word with elegance. My mother twitched at each name. I wondered if there was something wrong. "Is there something wrong, Mom?"

"No, I just don't want you to be around them anymore." She said. I could hear her voice; it was partly angry, and partly calm.

"Mom! No! They're my friends! I want—,"

"I said you aren't going to hang around with them. They're very dangerous and could get you in a lot of trouble."

"No! They aren't trouble!"

"How would you know? You've only known them for a day." She said angrily at me. I knew that my mother was _not _in the mood for an argument, at least, not now. I sighed and placed the groceries on the marble counter, not even bothering to help her put them away, due to the fact that I was so pissed at her right now. Why couldn't she accept that I have new friends? Ugh!

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I stormed angrily up the marble steps, into my room and slammed the door shut behind me. I angrily walked out on to the balcony and stared outside, it was beginning to get cloudy. I walked back into my room and sat on my bed, crossed my arms, and glared outside. Just when I got so happy, someone had to ruin my day! I hated that! It always happened!

I looked at the clock; it was 7:48 P.M. My bedtime was at 10:00. I lied down on my bed, not even caring about brushing my teeth, or combing my hair, or even changing into my pajamas. I just stared outside, watching the rain fall down heavily until I fell asleep.

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	4. Chapter 4

IV. Emerald

My dream was still abnormal, just like the rest of them I had. I was in class, and I sat by Rynn, Chalice, Jarissa, and Veronica. It was a normal school day, and we were in Chemistry class. In the dream, the four of them were grinning at me as if I was something to eat.

"What?" I had asked them. They just smirked at me, and in the dream, I was completely fine the way they stared at me, which was weird. Any _normal _person would have been frightened the way they stared at me; I guess I was just an abnormal freak.

"Tragedy, why don't you follow us?" Chalice asked me in the dream. She grinned at me, but all of a sudden, Dominique broke through the roof and stared at me.

"Tragedy." He told me. His voice deep, and his obsidian eyes staring into my fiery ones. Chalice, Jarissa, Rynn, and Veronica cowered away from him, scared. In the dream, I was confused when I looked up at my older brother. Suddenly—

I woke up.

I sat up, looking at my clock once again; it was about 7:08. I looked at myself in the vanity mirror. My fiery red hair was all in snarls and tangles. I also smelled badly too, like I just swam in mud.

I jumped off my bed and opened the door, my eyes halfway open—or halfway shut—and saw that Dominique came out of his room the exact same time as I did. His jet-black hair was all messy and sticking up. I had to laugh at him. He looked so pathetic, he even ran into the wall on the way to the bathroom! Ha!

"Morning, Dom." I said to him snickering. He looked at me with tired eyes, even dark circles under his eyes from lack of sleep. Had he stayed a Locke's house since midnight or something?

He looked at me, and then gave a chuckle. He ruffled my red hair and I just blinked. He was so nasty to me yesterday, even though it was our birthday...wait...our birthday. No one even told us happy birthday! Well, Mom and Dad _did _come home late, and so did Dominique...I think. I walked to my bathroom and shut the door behind me. I looked at myself; a complete and disastrous mess. I laughed at myself. I looked more like a cave dweller—or cave_woman_—than a human being.

I suddenly realized that my back was hurting. It couldn't have been my Scoliosis...could it? No, my Scoliosis could not have been the cause. It was _much _more painful than that. I winced in my pain, and took a deep breath, and suddenly, the pain was gone. It was so weird. It was as if something was trying to shoot out of my back!

I shook my head from the thought of the pain, and began to brush through my hair. I made a little screech every time I brushed through a snarl. It hurt like heck, believe me. I eventually made through the painful brushing, luckily. Next was washing my face with soap and warm water. I splashed my face, lightly rubbed the soap over my face, and

splashed my face again and again, getting rid of the oils on my porcelain skin.

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I grabbed my toothbrush, gently squirted my mint toothpaste onto the brush, and lightly dripped some water onto the brush. I placed the toothbrush to my pearly-white teeth, and began to brush..._hard_. The force that my hand put into my toothbrush smashed so hard against my teeth, I swear there could have been a hole placed in my mouth. I winced, pulling the toothbrush away to see that there was no hole, and no damage. Since when have I ever been so strong?

Nevertheless, from the strong force, came an advantage. My teeth were literally _sparkling_. They had never done that before, which was a really big surprise for me. I just placed the toothbrush back in the little slot Mom had installed for me by the sink. I placed the toothpaste next to the toothbrush slot, and walked out of my bathroom. I had forgotten that I had smelled too. I sighed. I walked back into the bathroom and shut it silently behind me. I stripped myself of my clothes from yesterday, turned the shower on, and stepped in; feeling the warm welcome the hot shower water gave me.

I began to sing the song "American Idiot" by _Green Day_. I was quite fond of that band. I was a rocker, unlike so many other girls. While other _normal _girls listened to rap crap and pop, I listened to rock and heavy metal.

I continued to sing in the shower, washing my hair with my favorite watermelon-smelling shampoo. I washed out the shampoo completely, then grabbed a rag, squirted some soap into the rag, rubbed it together with my hands, and began to wash my body. I was feeling more..._refreshed_ and clean while allowing the shower water to drench my skin of most germs, getting rid of the nasty gross germs.

After a while, I turned the knob of the shower off, causing the water to stop, and allowing the drain to well, drain all the water. I stepped out of the shower, walked over to a cupboard, and grabbed a Venetian-red towel out. I wrapped the crimson towel 'round my upper chest so it covered _everything_.

I opened the bathroom door, allowing the steam to come out from the bathroom, and I saw Dominique, staring at me.

"What do you want?" I asked icily with a glare.

"Nothing." He said softly, still staring at me.

"Stop staring at me, you pervert!" I yelled at him angrily, and walked into my bedroom to slam the door behind me. He seemed to be in a much better mood than I was, but I just continued to feel so pissed off. Ugh!

I closed the curtains of my balcony and windows and dropped the towel, grabbing all the proper clothing. I grabbed a green shirt that said, "Love the earth" on it. Yes, I was a tree-hugger. No, I was not a hippie.

I changed into some Levi jeans, allowing them to show off my skinny, slender legs. I had to admit, I looked pretty hot. Well, not _hot _but enough to probably get the guys to stare at me.

I walked out of my bedroom. Constance came out with a pink shirt that had a My Little Pony on it, plus she wore a carnation-pink skirt that went down to her tiny little knees. I smiled at her warmly.

"Morning Constance." I said to her, and she looked up at me with a goofy grin on her cute pale face.

"Good morning, Tragedy!" She squealed cutely, and then burst into giggles. I laughed she was so high-spirited. I grinned at her and ruffled her jet-black hair.

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Constance and I walked down the stairs. I noticed with the corner of my fire-red eyes that Dominique was walking down the marble steps behind us. I turned my head to him to award him with a sneer. Ha. That's what he gets for staring at me when the only clothing I have on is a fricken' towel! He just stared at me with slightly wide eyes, but just said nothing.

I then walked into the kitchen where I grabbed a box of Honeycombs, a bowl, a spoon, the jug of milk, and I sat over at the dinner table. I saw Constance plop down on the seat next to me with her Cheerios. We both stuck our tongues out at Dominique, who just seemed completely clueless. I saw that he just rolled his eyes at us as if we were the biggest idiots in the world.

"Tragedy, if you're still mad at me from staring at you, get over it. God, you act like a little kid sometimes." Dominique ordered at me with annoyance in his tone. He was getting a little irritated with me, I could tell.

"What if I'm a little kid at heart? Huh? What are _you _going to do about _that_? Huh?" I taunted him with a smirk on my lips. He just gave me a long stare, and then began to eat his breakfast as if nothing happened.

_She has to act like such a brat sometimes. _I heard Dominique say without moving his lips. Wait, back up there a second. Was he using _telepathy_ or somethin'? 'Cause I swear I heard him say something.

"I'm not a brat, you idiot!" I yelled at him. His coal eyes bulged a little, in surprise. He hadn't expected that, for sure.

"How did you—,"

"Do _not _ask me." I answered his question even before he asked it. The conversation came to an end as we all started eating our food. Mom and Dad had left for work early, so the three of us were left here.

"Hey! Guess what!" Constance yelled out. Dominique and I just stared at her. Dominique was the first one to speak.

"What?" He asked her.

"I made lots of new friends!" She cheered. Dominique and I both grinned at her while she smiled broadly.

"That's cool." Dominique said with total ease. He walked over to the fridge to eat something. He saw nothing, and decided to go eat some toast. I watched him while eating my cereal, and saw that on the back of his neck, was a black mark that resembled a wing. What the heck did he do to himself? Get a tattoo at Locke's house?

"Hey, Dom, what's that on the back of your neck?" I asked him a little angrily, I knew he could sense it. He turned around, and immediately placed his hand on the back of his neck, so I couldn't see the mark anymore.

"Oh, uh, that? It's nothin'. One of those temporary tattoos that I got at Locke's house last night." He said. Liar. It wasn't temporary, it was most likely permanent, the one's where they stick a germ-infested needle into your skin so you can get other people's diseases.

"_Sure_. Like I'm supposed to believe _that_. If you don't tell me right now, I'll tell Mom and Dad that you secretly get permanent tattoos at strangers' houses." I threatened him. He gave a sigh and then pointed to me.

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"You've got one too, except yours is a white wing." He said to me. I gasped, placing my hand on the back of my neck, and touching the outline of the wing. What the heck was happening? I wanted to find out right now!

"What the hell did you do to me? How did I get this mark on my neck? Tell me right now, Dominique! This isn't f—,"

"I didn't do anything, neither did anyone else." He said vacantly, no expression in his voice whatsoever. I glanced at Constance to see her blinking and totally confused. I would too if my older siblings had weird wing-shaped marks on the back of their necks.

"Well then how did this..._mark_ get on my neck?" I asked, my tone reflecting the emotion of fury. Constance stood up out of her seat.

"I'm going to go brush my teeth..." She said, taking her cereal, bowl, and spoon to the sink. She dumped the milk and cereal into the drain, placed her bowl and spoon in the skin, and placed the box of cereal back into the cupboard. Dominique and I watched her until she was out of sight.

"Listen, I didn't want this to happen. I didn't even know this was supposed to happen until yesterday." He said while walking over to me. I arched an eyebrow, what the heck was he talking about?

"Make sense, Dom." I said, irritated.

"What?" He asked, not getting what I was trying to tell him.

"I don't know what the heck you're talking about."

"Follow me." He said, a little boredom filling the tone of his vacant voice. I was still confused.

"Wait, what about school?" I asked, worried that maybe I might become tardy, and then rumors start flying around at school about how delinquent I am...

"I'll call the school and tell them you're sick."

"What about Constance?" I asked again, worried this time about my sister's sake. She absolutely loved school; it would nearly kill her to miss a day of it, especially since she made new friends.

"She can walk to school on her own." He said, now the tone of his voice a little annoyed by the so many questions I piled on top of him.

"She's only six!" I exclaimed in pure shock.

"So? She's a strong kid." He said, blankly.

"Dominique, be reasonable! She's only a young, little six-year old girl who doesn't have much muscle!" I yelled at him, hopefully, Constance wouldn't find out we were arguing about her.

"You're wrong in that department. She has power...but she doesn't know how to use it...yet." He said; I could hear a smirk in his voice when he spoke to me. Again, I was confused. Now, he was making no sense, as if he spoke a foreign language that I had no clue how to translate.

"Ok, you lost me." I told him as confusion swept over me with millions of questions. He just sighed again. Dominique stood up from his seat, and began walking towards the door. I began to follow him, not bothering to put all my breakfast stuff away in the sink.

The two of us walked outside, seeing that morning sun. Dominique made a left, making us go into the backyard.

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"Dom, c'mon. Tell me what's going on!" I yelled at him. He just ignored me and continued walking. He led me to the backyard, and began to walk towards the emerald-green forest that lay in front of us.

"Why are we going in there?" I asked; he ignored me, again. I sighed, knowing he wouldn't explain anything to me until we reached the destination spot, which apparently, was the densely-vegetated forest.

"...I'll show you once we get far enough in here." He said, sounding as if he was looking for something important, but what?

We continued walking, the wet forest welcoming us. The dirt had morphed into mud, thanks to last night's storm. The leaves of the trees were all wet also. Did Dominique have to show me whatever he wanted to show me..._today_? I mean, it was all wet and sticky and gross!  
"We're almost there." He reported to me with a dull tone. I nodded my head, which made me look as if I understood what he was talking about, which was a total false statement.

We stopped at an ancient relic of some sort. There was a red and white rose on the huge ancient rock. I blinked in surprise.

This was the bleeding rose I had seen in my dream.

"W-What is that?" I asked, my voice stuttering from the complete amazement that was filling my body.

"You'll find out soon." My twin brother told me, authority filling up his deep, low voice.

Dominique picked the bleeding rose up, and it was seriously, literally _bleeding_. Dominique gestured to me to pick it up, and I did. The moment I did, I dropped it and suddenly...

We were falling.

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	5. Chapter 5

V. Pearl

Ok, we were..._falling_. I screamed at the top of my lungs. Dominique seemed completely calm; his arms were folded to his chest as he patiently looked down. He landed on his feet, and surprisingly, I did too.

"WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED?" I screamed at him, my eyes watering from complete fear. My legs quivered fast and uncontrollably. Dominique glanced over at me.

"You'll see." He said calmly and almost quietly. I glared at him and started to scream at him again.

"Damn it! Tell me what's happening right now! We just fell through a trapdoor! I'm getting sick and tired of you telling me that I'll see! I'm seeing _nothing_!" I yelled at him while cursing loudly at him. I was furious, and somebody was going to get hurt if someone didn't tell me what was happening.

"Just be a little more patient." He said, irritation filling his voice while he started to walk in a hallway with rock walls. I sighed, and looked around at our current location, wondering if anyone had ever been in here.

"What happens if these rock walls collapse on us and we die?" I asked him. He laughed a little, but I saw no joke in the question I asked. I had seen so many news articles about miners in mines where the whole dig place had collapsed and they (or most of them) had died. I didn't want to happen, at least, not yet.

"No, trust me. That won't happen, and even if it _does_, you and I are both strong enough that we wouldn't die." He said with a grin. A grin I had missed ever since we were little kids.

"Ok, explain this to me, Dom, how is a girl with absolutely _no _muscle, and a guy who has hardly _any _muscle going to stay alive when rocks with _lots_ of force are going to start tumbling down upon us?" I asked to him. How was he going to get himself out of this one?

"Trag, when I show you what our family's made of, _trust me_, we'll be fine. Now, come on." He said with a laugh. My mouth just hung open as I stared at him with disbelief filling my eyes.

We walked until we reached a door where Dominique pressed his hand to the machine that scans hands, like the ones in movies. The rocky door opened, and we walked in. Inside was a huge laboratory with DNA and stuff like that. I blinked, is _this_ what he wanted to show me?

"Dom—,"

"This is the laboratory of Professor Jacob Fischer. He was a mastermind when it came to science. He was the most brilliant out of all his colleagues and classmates in collage. Although, his favorite sciences was those of the supernatural.

"The Professor researched different creatures such as half-breeds, especially the

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ones that consisted of half-humans. He began to research and found out creatures such as werewolves, and creatures of that sort. He had no idea that he would stumble across creatures that were celestial.

"On October 13th, 1908, Professor Fischer stumbled across DNA samples that he had taken from his colleagues that changed his life forever. He discovered that the existence of angels really did exist, and that a sub-species of black-winged angels existed. He also found out that vampires, hybrids, werewolves, and millions of other breeds of supernatural beings existed also.

"He noticed that all the white-winged angels' eyes were a light scarlet color, that all the black-winged angels were black-eyed, that vampires were silver-colored, humans were blue, green, hazel, or brown-colored, and so on. He also saw that werewolves were violet-colored, the demons were white-eyed, hybrids had golden-colored irises, and many other mutant creatures had different colored eyes. He began to notice that his calculations were correct. Seventeen out of his five-hundred classmates were white-winged angels, two were black-winged angels, eighteen were vampires, three were demons, five were hybrids, and twenty-two were werewolves, and the rest— including him — were regular human beings.

"He began to study more and found out that all celestial, angel creatures were the enemies of vampires, demons, and hybrids. The werewolves were the neutrals. The angels have always had a long loathing for the vampires, demons, and hybrids. They chose to pick their fights in isolated areas so that normal humans couldn't see what they really were.

"Fischer began to investigate more research on the supernatural creatures. Other ways to define the different creatures marks on different parts of their bodies. White-winged angels had white wing marks on the back of their necks; black-winged angels had black wing marks on the back of their necks also. Hybrids had a black lightning bolt on the middle of their chest, vampires had a tear drop on the back of their head—which was most of the time covered by their hair—and then the werewolves had a crescent shape on their back somewhere.

"More investigation and research was done on these mythical and legendary creatures. Fischer saw that the angels were born with powers, but not with wings. The angels, both black and white-winged, got their wings at the age of eighteen. They also involuntarily used their powers more often than before. Which meant, that if an angel was to slap their best buddy on the back, they could accidentally push them to the floor so hard, that the person who fell would make a hole. The Professor also found out that vampires fed off the blood of humans and angels, although, angels' blood was more luscious and delicious than regular human blood. It was also found that werewolves reached maturity at age of twenty, which meant at every _new _moon, the humans would transform into the wolf creatures. Most legends say that werewolves transformed at _full _moons, which was not the case, it was just a mishearing and a mistake. In addition, there was legend that said that if a werewolf were ever to kill a vampire, that the moon would morph from silver to a crimson color, because werewolves somewhat had the control over the moon, and that if a vampire was killed by a werewolf, that the blood the vampire had drunken would spill over the moon. This case has only occurred twice in the past, and usually never occurs because it is so rare for a werewolf to attack.

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"Hybrids then came into view. Hybrids were different from the rest of the supernatural creatures Professor Fischer researched about. They were free to transform from their normal human self to their hybrid form they—,"

"What are hybrids?" I asked, curiously. Dominique sighed.

"They hybrids that live in today and yesterday's world. They are regular humans, who, at the age of eighteen, have a body mutation that make them have blue reptile skin. The hybrids in many stories speak of half-breeds. These ones are half-serpent half-human. They hybrid form also has slit-like eyes that reflect the color of gold. Besides them having gnarled skin, they also may transform into a serpent form. All the serpent forms are green as emeralds, and look a lot like the green boas you seen in movies and books.

"Now, to talking about demons. Yes, demons are the fallen angels that followed Lucifer to Hell, although the ones today that exist in the real world aren't in the shape of humans at all. They look like normal humans, except for the fact that the irises in their eyes are barely visible, but, once they transform into their demon form, they are almost indestructible. They look like bulls, except their eyes are pure white, their horns are pure white, they stand on two feet, and their skin is a Venetian-red color. Their appearance is very intimidating, and almost nightmarish. The only way to kill a demon is to stab a stake through their heart in front of a full moon.

"Now, talking about vampires. Fischer found out that the vampires only drank the blood of humans and angels. The only way a vampire was killed, was to use Phoenix Fire on them. Only a Phoenix can kill a vampire. Now, not all demons, hybrids, and vampires are evil. Some are actually good, it was just that angels had always called them rivals and have always hated them.

"Phoenixes are rare, and quite, quite powerful. They are the element of fire, and are at least about seven feet tall. They breathe fire, and are immortal no matter what. There are only about one hundred in the world though, each one hiding its identity. They are loving and protective creatures that only obey their masters that are soul-given. Most of the time, angels are their masters since the Phoenix is fire, and fire brings light to everything.

"In the world that we know today, there are two different kinds of angels. Black-winged angels and white-winged angels. These creatures are the only ones ever to be born with magical powers, although most of the time, they do not realize they have such powers because they believe they are human, just like everyone else, until they reach the age of eighteen, that is when they find out they are what they are.

"Black-winged angels are control the power of darkness, while the white-winged angels control light, but both are allies towards each other. White-winged angels are more famous in the world than the black-winged angels. Most white-winged angels are shown in stories of the Bible while the black-winged ones are left out. Each angel has his or her own element that he or she controls. Like, mine is strength, and I'm guessing yours is telepathy." Dominique said as he walked around in the laboratory. Was I really an angel or was he just trying to scare me like most of the time?

"Dom, you've got to be joking. _Angels_?" I said loudly and he turned around with a blank expression on his pale face.

"I'm one hundred percent serious, Tragedy. Mom and you are white-winged

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angels while Constance, Dad, and I are black-winged angels. That's how I picked Robert Milling up and threw him against the wall!" He said, placing his hand on his forehead in thought.

"So, did you memorize that story, or what?" I asked him.

"Yeah."

"How did you find out?" I wondered. Who had shown him to this area?

"Dad talked to me after I got home from Locke's house last night. He told me _everything_, and he said to tell you about it." He informed me, and I blinked. Whoa, this could _not_ be happening.

"So, why didn't you guys tell me what was happening?" I asked.

"You were sleeping when I came home."

"What time did you come home at?"

"About eleven-thirty or so. Mom seemed really tense though. I asked her what was wrong and she didn't tell me." Dominique told me with a soft sigh escaping from his lips. I blinked. What could Mom be so upset about? I shook my head, and then began to fill up with millions of questions.

"Ok, so, are all those creatures, like, born that way?" I questioned him, and a chuckle came from him.

"Angels, demons, and werewolves are born genetically. Like, your parents have to have been either one of those creatures. Hybrids are formed. Hybrids are formed by having another Hybrid biting them, and so the venom swims into their body and mutates them. Vampires are randomly born. There is no way of knowing a child is a vampire unless you look at their eyes, which usually are mistaken for a pale blue instead of silver."

"What do you mean 'born randomly'?" I asked, not exactly getting what he was saying.

"Vampires are just born. There doesn't have to be any genetics for a vampire to be born, they just are. They are also born with their powers." Dominique explained to me, and I nodded my head.

"So...we have wings?" I asked again, and my twin nodded his head to me. I blinked, and suddenly, out from his back sprung jet-black feathery wings. My fire eyes widened largely as I stared at my brother, now and always will be a black-winged angel. I stared at him, too bewildered to say anything to him.

"All you have to do is imagine you have wings." He said, and I tried it. Suddenly, I felt a jolt of pain as I shrieked. White wings that were as lovely white as pearls shot out of my back.

"WHOA!" I yelled as I stared at them, screaming in awe. He laughed and nodded his head. I suddenly felt the control of some other part of my body, my new pearl-white wings.

"Yeah, you can fly too, and since your element is most likely telepathy, you probably can lift things with your mind, kinda freaky if you ask me." Dominique laughed and I looked around again, screeching with entertainment.

"Can we go home?" I asked, and felt somehow my wings go back into my back. Dominique nodded his head, and I glanced around again.

"How _do _we get out?" I asked Dominique.

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Dominique grabbed my wrist and pulled me behind me.

"Also, black-winged angels are pale, and so are hybrids and demons. White-winged angels and vampires are porcelain-colored. Werewolves are just tan. So, if you see a dude or dudette with tan skin and violet eyes, they're most likely werewolves."

"Oh, I'll keep that in mind."

Dominique led me to a flight of rock steps that went up. He began to climb the set of stairs, and I silently followed behind him.

We found ourselves back in the forest, on the other side of the relic where the bleeding rose was. I started running, and Dominique followed behind me, once we got to the door that led into the back of the house, I slowly opened it.

I looked at one of the clocks on the wall and saw that it was 11:07. I looked around, Dominique was right, Constance _must've _walked to school on her own, and then he was right about something else. Since Constance was a black-winged angel, just like Dominique, she also was strong like one. It made me wonder what element she was going to have...

"Hey, Dom. I got another question for ya." I said to him, and his head perked up in my direction. He arched an eyebrow.

"What?"

"What was...that...that flower?"

"Oh, you mean the bleeding one?" He asked, and I just nodded my head. When I had dropped the precious object, it had opened some sort of trap door, which made us fall.

"That's the Flower of Purity. It—,"

"Wow, Dad _really _had you memorize that stuff, huh?"

"Yeah, anyways, the Flower of Purity is a flower that bleeds for eternity, but is only visible to those of pure-hearts, and once a pure-heart touches it, it opens a trapdoor. Did that answer your question?" He wondered, and yes, it did, so I nodded my head.

"So, did you call the school?" I pondered, and he nodded his head. Wow, probably when I was screaming around, he called them.

"Oh, I'm going to you know, uh, go to school." I reported to him, grabbing my backpack, but then he caught my arm in his grasp.

"I told them you were sick."

"Well, by the grace of the almighty God, a miracle happened and I survived!" I told him, and we both laughed; just like old times.

Therefore, I walked out of the house, and started to walk towards school. Awkwardly, the streets were streets were still crowded, even though everyone was at work. I just shrugged the thought away and continued walking. School was about two blocks away from our mansion-like house, but I didn't care. I needed exercise.

While walking, I saw a guy—about the age of probably twenty-one—staring at me from about ten feet behind me, as if I was a runway fashion model. I tried to ignore him, which was hard because he just continued to grin at me. I started to walk faster, which was stupid because the guy behind me walked faster. Now I _knew _he was stalking me. Freakazoid.

I continued to walk fast until I saw the school building in sight. I glanced over at the guy behind me, and he was smirking. I gulped, this guy wanted to do something that I

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know most girls _wouldn't _want to do.

"Hey loser! Go pick on someone your own size!" I yelled to him involuntarily. _Great job smarts._ I told myself, because the guy started to glare at me, and his pace was _faster_, he was at least five feet behind me now. I started running faster, and I almost tripped over a huge rock.

I peered into the dude's thoughts, which was almost as bad as yelling at the guy 'cause what I saw was almost the most sickening thing I had ever saw. I got out of his thoughts and ran across the street, and into the school campus. I stopped to see the guy run across the street, and get hit by a red Mustang. I gasped and slapped my hands over my mouth. The dude flung about twenty feet into the air before smashing into the blacktop. I saw people slam the brakes on and call 911. I stared in horror, and then ran to the school doors, and opened them with my element trick. Luckily, the alarms didn't go off.

I looked at the clock, and saw it was 11:15. Lunch was supposed to be going on right now. I hurried to find myself last in the class I would have gone to lunch with. I noticed that Veronica, Jarissa, Chalice, and Rynn were all staring at me kindly.

"Hey you guys." I said, panting a little. Rynn arched an eyebrow.

"Did something happen, Tragedy?" She asked her British accent quite strong.

"Nope, just thought I would run to school today." I lied, and laughed a little. Actually, I had to admit, the lie was pretty believable.

"Oh." I heard Veronica say. I had totally forgotten that Veronica, Jarissa, Chalice, and Rynn all had silver eyes, like Dominique told me. I had noticed it on my first day of school, but I remembered now. Silver eyes...that meant what again?

_"He noticed that all the white-winged angels' eyes were a light scarlet color, that all the black-winged angels were black-eyed, that vampires were silver-colored, humans were blue, green, hazel, or brown-colored, and so on. He also saw that werewolves were violet-colored, the demons were white-eyed, hybrids had golden-colored irises, and many other mutant creatures had different colored eyes."_ Dominique's words rang in my head more and more. I studied my friends' eyes and saw something I most likely probably wouldn't have wanted to see. The reason my mom wouldn't have liked me hanging around Veronica, Jarissa, Rynn, or Chalice. The reason those four girls looked at me hungrily in my dream. The reason why Chalice was able to jump off my balcony and perfectly land on her feet without any injuries of any kind. There was only one explanation for all of that, and that explanation made me feel somewhat unsafe around them, just like how Mom said that they were dangerous to be around with. It was because...

Chalice, Veronica, Jarissa, and Rynn were vampires.

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	6. Chapter 6

VI. Topaz

So, Rynn, Chalice, Jarissa, and Veronica were..._vampires_. Vampires that were the enemies of all angels. No wonder Mom had gotten so mad at me when I told them I had friends, because they were vampires that were quite powerful...but vampires only realized what they were when they turned eighteen, those guys weren't eighteen, right...?

I lightly poked Jarissa on the shoulder, and she turned her cheerleader face towards me.

"Yeah, girl?" She asked in her high-pitched voice.

"How old are you guys?" I asked them; hoping that they wouldn't be eighteen, well, not yet anyways.

"Well, um, Rynn's nineteen, 'cause she was held back a year in kindergarten, and Veronica is seventeen, but her birthday's next Thursday. I turned eighteen in July, and Chalice doesn't turn eighteen until January 17th, why?" She cocked her head to the side and blinked.

"Just wondering, since my birthday was yesterday. I wanted to see if I was the only eighteen-year old." I said, Jarissa laughed a little, then got back in line for the food again. Oh crap. My best friends were vampires, and two were (or was) already eighteen! Rynn was nineteen! She was probably more experienced! Ugh, why was I freaking out? Those guys wouldn't hurt me, right...?

We continued to walk in line, and I felt someone behind me poke me in the back. I turned around to see a guy with blue eyes, porcelain-skin, and jet-black hair. Locke Marcus.

"Hey Locke. Was Dominique well-behaved at your house last night?" I asked teasingly. I laughed, and he joined in the laughter. He nodded his head with a friendly grin that radiated brilliance and kindness.

"Yeah, he was pretty good. Dude when we were playing Need for Speed he—,"

"I am not a _dude_, I am a dude_tte_." I corrected him. He rolled his beautiful blue eyes and laughed.

"Yeah, whatever. So, where's Dom today?"

"Oh, he got sick. Probably from you." I said with another laugh. Locke arched an eyebrow in confusion.

"Huh?"

"He got sick, and then I said from you. I was joking around by saying he was sick of you, which isn't true 'cause Dominique doesn't dump his friends that easily. I was just joking, Locke, don't take it so seriously." I grinned and patted his shoulder. He just blankly blinked and nodded. We walked further in line, and I could hear Jarissa chattering about how much crappy homework she was loaded with for the weekend. I attempted to peer into Locke's thoughts, just because I felt like it.

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_Dom's sister sure looks hot in that shirt..._ My face instantly morphed into a blush of light carnation-pink. Ok, this was possibly the weirdest day in my eighteen years of living. First, I was an angel. Second, since I was an angel, my element was reading people's thoughts and using telepathy, and third, my brother's best friend was hitting on me.

"Hey, Locke, looks like that ginger over there wants to talk to you." I told him. I had used the _South Park_ slang version of ginger. Ginger, at least in _South Park_, meant a redheaded kid with freckles. _South Park _was probably not a very good show for me—or anyone—to watch.

"Ginger?" Locke asked. Man! Was he stupid or what? He must have been, 'cause it seems like I have to explain every single thing to him! I pointed to the girl with long, red hair like mine, and freckles dotting her pretty porcelain face.

"Oh, you mean Katherine Lillian?" He said, pointing to the exact girl I was talking about.

"Yeah, Katherine what's-her-face. Go talk to her." I said, and Locke walked over to the ginger girl, and I just shrugged my shoulders. Yeah, I know, I have red hair too, but I don't have freckles, so I don't classify as a "ginger".

"Hey, Trag. You going to stay there all day, or are you going to eat?" I heard Chalice's voice say. I jerked my head to her and I noticed those guys were already farther in line. I gasped partly, grabbed a milk carton, and ran to get my tray. I filled my tray with some applesauce, noodles, and crackers, and then typed in my lunch number. I saw that Chalice, Veronica, Jarissa, and Rynn were already at their seats, so I just walked over to sit with them.

"Hey, you guys going to the football game tonight?" Jarissa asked everyone. Veronica nodded her head while Chalice shrugged her shoulders. Rynn said she wasn't a sports person, and I just remained silent.

"Hey, Tragedy, you goin' to the game tonight?" Chalice asked me, and Rynn just stared at me with a soft smile. Maybe my vampiric friends weren't so bad after all. Like Dominique said, not all of them are bad.

"Uh, yeah. What time does it start?"

"I think 'bout around seven possibly?" She guessed, looked around, and saw that Rynn was the only one nodding her head. Veronica looked away and around, trying to avoid eye contact with me. For some reason, everyone was acting all quiet, why? Jarissa was usually a chatterbox, and Chalice was always trying to have her shut up. Rynn would calm the area, and Veronica would occasionally talk.

"Hey, you guys ok?" I asked, and they all nodded their heads. The whole lunch period was quiet, except for all the other tables buzzing with gossip about who was the next hottest star and movie.

"Yeah, I just stayed up last night watching _Scream_. Scared the heck out of me too, and I had nightmares." Chalice said, leaning a little bit back, even though there was no _back _for her to lean on since the tables were basically like picnic tables.

"There is not much to talk about." Rynn said, sighing. I cocked my head to the side. Rynn was a little right; there _wasn't _much to talk about.

"What are you guys doing for the weekend? I mean, it's Labor Day weekend. You guys are doing something, aren't you?" I asked them.

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"Nah, I don't do much stuff except chill out at home except sleep." Chalice said, boredom filling up her dull voice. Veronica nodded her head, pushing her metallic-silver locks of hair out of her face and tucked back behind her ears.

"Why don't we throw a party?" Jarissa chirped as she enthusiastically grinned. She even clapped her hands because she was so excited, I just had to laugh at her.

"Who's house?" Chalice asked, leaning on the table. We all glanced at each other, and I blinked. All eyes suddenly went on me.

"_My _house?" I asked with a little high-pitched squeak in my voice. Chalice nodded her head.

"Well, _yeah_, I mean, your house rocks!" Chalice exclaimed, now all eyes were on her. I wondered if that was a bad thing or not.

"When did you go to her house?" Rynn curiously asked.

"Yesterday. What's it to you?" Chalice asked with a slight scowl. Rynn shook her head.

"Oh, just wondering." She blankly stated with her British accent that was as clear as glass.

"Why can't it be at any of your guys' houses?" I complained with a whine echoing in my voice.

"My mother despises parties." Veronica said blandly.

"Um, like, my house is like totally way small!" Jarissa said with her high-pitched prep voice.

"I would, but there are too many antiques at my house." Rynn said with slight disappointment in her voice.

"Dude! Your house is _way_ cooler than mine!" Chalice exclaimed loudly. I sighed, I had to give in, I was too peer pressured.

"Fine, fine. Whatever." I said, a little annoyed. The bell rang, and we all rose up from our seats. I dumped the leftover food into the garbage, and placed my tray away. I then walked out of the cafeteria. My next class after lunch was chemistry, and Chalice, Jarissa, Veronica, and Rynn were all in that class with me, and unfortunately, Locke was too. A thought suddenly struck to my mind. I had just agreed to let four vampires at my house for a party. How was Dominique going to handle that information? Maybe I could somehow persuade Locke to have Dom over again? That would be pretty easy since I knew that Locke had a major crush on me, which was a little scary.

I walked into chemistry class and sat at my normal seat, which happened to be by the window. Our chemistry teacher, Ms. Louise, was starting to teach us about the chemical compounds and all this scientific stuff I didn't care about. I continued to reverie about how my life was going to work, and who my friends were going to be...and who my enemies would be; hopefully not Jarissa, Veronica, Chalice, or Rynn.

_Ugh, why do we have to listen to this? It's boring!_ I listened to Chalice's thoughts and secretly laughed to myself. I tuned in to Jarissa's thoughts. _Oh my God. Locke Marcus looks so hot and sexy! I just want to—_

I stopped listening to Jarissa's thoughts, not wanting to find out what she wanted to do to Locke. I listened to Veronica's thoughts this time. _...Hm. I wish Ms. Louise would think of something better to teach us..._ I stopped, and was ready to use my telepathic skills on Locke.

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_Tragedy is so fricken' hot, Dom would get so pissed at me though if he knew I was hittin' on his sister._ I laughed secretly to myself again. Dominique _would _be pretty ticked off. I began to listen to Rynn's thoughts.

_Stay out of my head, Tragedy._

My heart skipped a beat. She frightened me and I _did _get out of her head. My heart pulse increased, and she turned to me to give me an icy glare with her silver eyes. How did she know I was in her head?

I started to listen to Ms. Louise talk about the scientific stuff and blah blah. I was scared to look or even _think _about Rynn now. She knew I was reading her mind, and she was extremely mad about it.

The bell rang and I hurried to get all my stuff out before Rynn could talk to me. She sounded so serious and furious. Ha, that rhymed. Anyways, I was still shaken up after what happened in chemistry. I continued with the rest of my classes. Dominique hadn't come back to school, he just decided to play hooky today.

After school ended, Locke and Chalice walked over to me. Locke's face was red from embarrassment; I knew he was going to have trouble talking to me since he had a major crush on me.

"H-Hey Tragedy. I was, uh, wondering where Dominique was." He asked, I giggled at his stutter. I looked at Chalice and made a secret wink, she burst out laughing. She obviously knew in addition, of how much her cousin liked me. I decided that I'd try to be alluring to him and see what he would say.

"Oh Lockey. You're so cute when you stutter." I said in a rather seductive voice. Chalice literally fell to the ground, and rolled around laughing. I tried so hard not to laugh, and somehow I succeeded.

"Oh, uh, yeah." Locke said. He was finding it hard to speak without actually making a mistake. I placed my hands on his neck and looked deeply into his ocean-blue irises. Human ones.

"Locke, Locke...You're so..._dreamy_." I did my best to sound seductive, and it worked because Locke Marcus's face turned from a fair shade to a lobster-red. I made another giggle and Chalice laughed even _harder _this time.

"T-Tragedy...I h-have to go...B-Bye..." Locke said, stammering and stuttering as he got out of my grasped, but I somehow grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him towards me, our bodies in contact. I made a smirk at him while teasing him.

"Call me." I said, and Chalice held her stomach while her face literally turned purple from laughing so hard. Students just stared at her as if she was having a seizure or something like that. Locke's face was so red, he looked almost like he was laughing, but it was just pure embarrassment. Oh darn...now there were going to be rumors. Great job, Tragedy! You've got yourself a reputation now!

I looked around for Constance, and finally saw her. I grinned and swept her up into my arms, and she started to giggle.

"So, did you walk to school by yourself?" I asked cheerfully, but there wasn't anything cheerful about a six-year old black-winged angel walking to school on her own early in the morning.

"Yep!" She grinned, I just nodded, not very happy with the idea that my little sister walked to school all by herself when there are creeps in the world.

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Constance and I walked home. She told me about her day, but I didn't tell her about mine. I didn't want to tell her that Mom and I were white-winged angels, and that Dad, her, and Dominique were black-winged angels, and that four of my best friends were vampires.

"Hey, Tragedy?" Constance asked me cutely.

"Hm?" Was my only response at the time.

"Is Dom ok?" She asked, once again, it was unbearably cute on how she spoke her question.

"Dom? Yeah, he's fine, why?" I arched an eyebrow, he seemed perfectly fine to me today.

"...He's not with us." She said solemnly.

"He got sick, but he'll probably be good to go when we get home." I looked at her with a warm smile, and she seemed to believe me, and returned the soft smile.

When we got home, Mom and Dad were already there. Mom walked over to me and gave me a warm hug, patting my back where my pearly white wings were. She knew that I had already known.

"Hey! Why don't I get a hug?" Constance pouted. My mother laughed and pulled away from the warm bear hug, and crouched down to Constance, hugging her. I blinked and scratched the back of my head. Constance giggled ever so adorably, and then my mother pulled away. My dad ran his pale hands through his jet-black hair that almost looked gelled.

"So, where are we going to eat out at?" Dominique asked. I stared at him and gave a light blush. He looked...so _different_, and that was in a good way. I know thinking about my own _brother _like this was wrong, but I had to admit. He was so good-looking it was unbearable. His black hair lightly covered his obsidian eyes, and his hair was somewhat messy, which was a nice effect. I also noticed he was more built in the chest than before, and his face was more strikingly gorgeous. Had this all happened during school? I decided to look into his mind and see if he'd allow me to know exactly what had happened.

_This is something angels get too. Hot looks. _Dominique thought, and behind those coal locks, was a smirk. I looked away, ok, he wasn't hot, he was beyond what words could describe, but I was sure glad he couldn't read my mind.

"Hey, how about Outback?" My dad insisted, his voice deep like always. Outback Steakhouse was where we usually went for parties and celebrations, but I didn't get the reason why we were going there today, and now.

"Yes, that's fine." My mother, Lily, said. She had slight boredom in her voice, I could tell. So, Dad pulled out some keys to his new car—a new red Mustang—and walked out to the garage.

"Tragedy, are you all right?" My father, Storm, asked. I arched an eyebrow. Yeah, I was totally fine.

"Yeah, why?" I asked; my eyebrow still rose above my eye. My dad turned around to stare at me with his coal-black eyes His eyes were somewhat saddened, but they only looked that way to me, either that or no one seemed to want to look at them.

"Just wondering." He said, and I followed behind him as we stared at the Mustang. There was something wrong with the front of it, as if someone spilled crimson

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paint onto the front. Dad grasped my arm and led me to the back seat. I sat in the middle while Dom sat on my left and Constance on my right. Lucky. Both of 'em got the window seats!

Dad continued to drive..._fast_. He was going at least fifty miles per hour on a thirty-five limit highway. Dad was a scary driver, which is why we all preferred Mom as a driver, but Dad always refused to let a _woman_ drive his cars. He was such a sexist, not letting women drive his car.

I looked at Dominique, as he continued to stare at Dad suspiciously. Why was he doing that to Dad? I looked to Dad, and peered into his thoughts. I screamed at what I read and _saw _in his mind. Dominique clapped his hand over my mouth quickly. Mom, Dad, and Constance acted as if they didn't hear anything.

I reminisced over and over at what I saw in my father's head. The guy that was stalking me, get hit by my _dad's _Mustang, but the reason that made me scream was because my own father hit the guy on _purpose_. He _wanted _to kill him, and the reason behind that was unknown because it wasn't in my father's head.

We eventually made it to the steakhouse where we all got out. Dad locked the doors while Mom grabbed my by the arm and looked up at Dad with a smile.

"I'm going to show Tragedy around here, would you mind going inside and ordering for us?" My mother said to my dad with a generous, warm smile. He nodded his head and took Dominique and Constance into the steakhouse with him. Mom opened the Mustang car and pushed me in, and shut the passenger door. She got on the driver's side and shut the doors, locking them.

"All right, tell me what happened." She said, staring at me.

"Huh?"

"Why did you scream in the car?" She asked worry filling her tone.

"W-Well, my element is telepathy so I can read minds and pick thinks up with my mind." I started to explain.

"Yes, go on."

"And I saw Dominique was staring at Dad so I thought maybe I could look into Dad's head, and what I saw was Dad smashing and _killing _a guy with his Mustang. I was even there when the accident happened! I didn't know it was Dad in the car though! And in Dad's head, he said that he did it on purpose! And it scared me because what if he tried to kill us?" I shrieked, almost starting to burst into tears. Mother pulled me into a soft hug and patted my back with comfort.

"Don't worry, he wouldn't do that. I promise you that. Storm would never do such a stupid and reckless thing. I would know because I've been married to him for about twenty years." My mother said soothingly as her back continued to gently pat my back to make me feel better.

"Mom..." I said aloud.

"Yes, dear?"

"What's your element?" I curiously wondered. Since I was telepathy and Dominique was strength, what were the rest of my family?

"Unlocking." She simply said with elegance rolling off her tongue like a boulder in a rockslide.

"Unlocking?" I asked, I didn't get it.

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"I can open anything without any trouble, like this car." She said proudly as she smiled broadly.

"Can you start it?"

"I said _unlocking _not _starting_." Mother laughed a little, and I joined in with her. Soon, I was feeling completely better about the thing with Dad. Mom unlocked the car just by thinking about it, and we both got out.

"Can you lock stuff?" I asked her. She smiled and shook her head. I laughed with her and we both walked into the restaurant. We saw Dad, Dom, and Constance sitting at a booth in the non-smoking section, so we just strode over to them. Mom, Constance, and I sat on one side; Dominique and Dad were on the other side. Girls on one side, boys on the other.

"What did you get for me?" I asked them. I glanced from Dominique, who looked completely blank, to Dad who looked a little guilty.

"We didn't order you guys anything yet." My dad said, and we shrugged our shoulders. Suddenly, a gorgeous waiter—even more gorgeous than Dom was right now—came to us. He had brilliant topaz eyes, pale skin, and cropped-short chocolate hair. Dominique eyed at me urgently. I knew what he was thinking. This dude was a hybrid. But you know what? He was one smokin' hot hybrid.

"Hello, my name is Tyler I will be your waiter for the night, how may I help you?" The hot hybrid, named Tyler, gave a somewhat sly grin at me. I noticed he had a British accent, just like Rynn. I just stared at him dazzled.

"We'd like five waters, please." My mother said politely, flashing a kind smile as the waiter walked away. Dominique glanced at Mom and Dad, who were slightly frightened, but not much, I could tell by their expressions.

"Dominique are you ok now?" Constance asked. Dom cocked his head slightly to the side at first, and then nodded his head.

"Yep, I'm ok." He responded with a short nod.

"Did you have the flu?" She asked more. Dominique just shrugged his shoulders while winking at me.

"I guess." Dominique said, and then Tyler the extremely hot hybrid waiter came by with all of our waters. The hybrid winked at me and then grinned at us all friendly like. He really seemed nice.

"Are you all ready to order?" He asked, his voice was as smooth as glass. We all glanced at each other, and then nodded.

"I'll have your New York strip, and medium-well." My dad was the first to speak, and then Dominique went.

"I'll have the same thing except cooked rare." There goes Dominique, ordering the rare-cooked steaks. Now, it was Mother's turn.

"I would like your Cesar salad, please." Tyler the waiter nodded his head, and then glanced at me.

"Um, I want your uh, chicken fingers." I said, and the hybrid laughed.

"I'm sorry, that's only for kids younger than twelve. You look quite older." His laugh was ghostly, vacant, as if he had no soul.

"Well, can you just be a good soul and let me have them?" I said, holding my bottom lip out. Mom smacked me on the back of the head, and Constance giggled. Dad

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and Dominique rolled their obsidian eyes. The hybrid named Tyler just frowned at me when I said the word soul. I wondered if I offended him or not. Tyler looked from me to Constance.

"And you, sweetheart?" He said to her, Constance giggled and looked up at him with her adorable coal eyes.

"I want your macaroni and cheese!" She chirped, and Tyler laughed.

"All right, I'll be back with your food." The waiter said as he smirked at me from the side. Luckily, none of my family members saw him do that to me; I blushed and glanced over at Dominique.

I peered into Mom's head to see her thinking about what she was going to teach me when we got home; training for being a white-winged angel. I looked into Constance's head just for fun, and saw she was excited to watch an episode of _Spongebob Squarepants_.

We sat around the table talking about different and random different stuff most families would talk about at the dinner table: school, friends, grades, and homework that stuff. I tried to stay away from the friends category although.

Rynn was in my mind for a long time, not in a lovey-dovey sort, but just out of fear. She knew what I was, and what I could do, and she was furious about that. I had hoped that wouldn't destroy our friendship as good friends. She was too nice and loving to have as an enemy.

"Yeah! Then Brandon Zing chopped a block of wood with his bare hand! It was so cool, Mom!" Constance yelled enthusiastically. I blinked, coming out of my reverie of what Rynn said today. Dominique was laughing a little bit from hearing Constance's enthusiasm.

I realized that Tyler the hybrid waiter was walking over with our food. Had it really been a half hour already? Usually that's the time it takes for normal waiters to bring the food out. Wait, _normal _waiters were _humans_, this guy, Tyler, was a _hybrid_. A half-breed. Half-human, half-snake. Hybrids could change their look so they were blue-skinned, but I guessed that they didn't want to look like freaks, so they kept their normal, human.

"Wow that was fast." I stated with another blink. The hybrid looked at me with a smirk.

"I'm a fast waiter, what can I say?" He chuckled, and I just made a nervous laugh. This guy wasn't really hitting on me..._was he_? Darn it! Now two people are hitting on me! Ugh! I know I'm hot but dude, does every guy in the whole U.S. that isn't a relative _have _to have a crush on me?

"Ha, yeah." I said while he handed me my chicken fingers. I looked up at him to see that he winked at me with his topaz eyes. I attempted to peer into the guy's thoughts.

What? I couldn't read his mind! Darn! I probably wouldn't have wanted to read the guy's thoughts anyways. I looked into Mom's head to see if possibly she was thinking about this guy.

_Tragedy, angel elements don't work on hybrids. _She thought in her head. She didn't even glanced at me and I sighed. Maybe not looking into this guy's head was a good thing? What if he thought about some gross stuff like that one stalker dude? I

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glanced up at the Tyler dude; I then realized he had brown hair like Rynn. Were they related?

"Hey, do you know a girl by the name of Rynn?" I had to ask. Mother kicked me in the leg from underneath the table. Tyler nodded his head with a chuckle.

"I'm her brother. Tyler Quinney, I'm twenty years old." Tyler grinned at me. I wondered how he had become a hybrid when his own sister was a vampire. Who had bitten him?

I looked to Mom and Dad, and I could tell they were uncomfortable. I would have introduced myself, but I knew my parents would ground me for life if I did that. There was a long silence until Tyler was the one to speak.

"Well, enjoy your dinner." He said and hurried away. I grabbed a chicken finger and ripped part of it off with my teeth, and started to chew. Everyone else started to eat too.

"Yummy in my tummy!" Constance yelled loudly, giggling afterwards. Dominique chuckled, but I just stayed silent. Thinking about Tyler.

Oh my dear Lord, why was I thinking about him so much right now? I didn't even _know _him. Maybe it was just from his good looks. He was surely flattering, well, to me at least, but I shouldn't be thinking about him! He's my best friend's _older brother_!

I sighed, finishing my food. I was the first one done, and then Constance finished, then Dominique, Mom, and then Dad. Tyler came by again, smiled dazzlingly at me, and took our plates.

"How was everything?" He asked, I was the first one to chirp an answer.

"It was great!" Dominique sent me a look that said I should be keeping my mouth shut. I then locked my lips together and sat back.

"Here's the bill." The hybrid said, placing the bill on the table. Dad looked at it and used his Visa credit card. Tyler took the credit card with a wide smirk as he went to the cash register and ran the card through and handed it back to Father.

"Thank you, I hope you all have a nice evening." Tyler smirked so widely, his pearly-white teeth flashed, which sent a shiver down my spine. He looked so sinister and evil now, no wonder they were enemies of angels, but that didn't mean that he was a bad person, it was just his look was a little scary. I could only imagine what his hybrid form looked like.

Tyler walked away and we all rose from out seats swiftly. We exited the steakhouse and walked into the parking lot. I knew that if Constance wasn't with us, Mom and Dad would start yelling at me about the hybrid, but I couldn't help it! He was so beautiful, and seemed so nice!

I got in the backseat as well as Dominique and Constance. Mom drove this time, and Dad sat in the passenger seat. The ride home was silent, and when we got home, Constance ran inside to go into her room and sleep.

"Tragedy, do you know what you did wrong today?" My father sternly asked. Oh great, lecture time. I sighed and looked up at my father with my fire opal eyes.

"Dad! Tyler seemed really—,"

"That's no reason to start flirting with him." Dominique said, on my father's side.

"So what? I flirted with Locke Marcus today!" I yelled, Dominique's eyes slightly widened in anger.

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"Locke Marcus is a human." My mother softly said, but her voice was also strict.

"Why did you—," Dominique began, but I immediately interrupted him.

"He has a crush on me, so I thought it'd be funny, and it was. Chalice was—,"

"I thought I told you to stay away from Chalice Ridgeway." My mother angrily said, her voice rising just a bit.

"Mom! Chalice isn't evil!" I yelled.

"Take no chances!" My dad yelled. I glanced over at Dominique with a pleading look; hopefully, he'd switch to my side. I saw no help in his eyes whatsoever.

"Oh so hitting a guy is—,"

"He was going to hurt you and he was a—," I interrupted my dad again, fury raging up into my face to have my face morph from porcelain to a bright, angry shade of red.

"That's not a reason to hit someone with a Mustang!" I yelled loudly and stormed up the stairs, into my room, and slammed the door shut behind me. I was so furious. They were yelling at me because of someone who I thought seemed reasonably nice!

My cell phone on my desk started to ring.

I wondered who it would be, and I use telekinesis to bring my cell phone to me, just by using my thoughts. I picked it up and answered.

"Hello?"

"Tragedy?" said a male's voice. It was familiar...but I couldn't make out who it was.

"Yeah this is her. Who's this?"

"It's Aedan. How's Alaska?" He asked. My heart skipped a beat. Aedan, it felt like forever since I had talked to him last.

"It's great! How's everyone holding up back in Cali?" I asked cheerfully, a giggle in my voice. I always talked like this to Aedan, just 'cause I knew he like me talking like that.

"Mac's still pretty down. Jaden is handling things ok I had to call you. I just miss you so much. Brianna, Violet, and Macy are a little bit down, but they're handling it pretty good. Made any new friends yet?" Aedan asked.

"Yeah, they're names are Chalice, Jarissa, Rynn, and Veronica, but Mom won't let me hang out with them! I'm so mad!" I yelled into the phone, stressed out. Aedan was used to this.

"Why won't she? If you know." He said calmly, his voice was a smooth as glass. I sighed. I couldn't tell him that they were vampires that _might _try and kill me!

"She thinks they're a bad influence on me!" I screamed into the phone.

"But they aren't?" He asked again. Aedan was like my own private counselor. I could talk to him about _anything_, and he'd just remain calm.

"No! They're great and awesome and nice!" I sighed angrily and he just continued to talk softly with calmness.

"Well, I don't really have an answer for that, Tragedy. I'm sorry. I'm sure you must have already tried to convince them that they're good people. I'm sure they're good since they're your friends." His voice was sweet, like honey, and soft like a pillow. I nodded my head, even though he couldn't and didn't see it.

"All right, well, thanks for listenin' to me, Aedan."

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"Hm, what else is there to talk about?" He asked, although it wasn't a really direct question. He was just saying his thoughts like usual.

"You'll never guess what!" I yelled enthusiastically into the phone with more giggles coming from me.

"Yes?"

"I have two guys who have a major crush on me! One's eighteen and the other is twenty!" I laughed a little, but I heard no response from Aedan, for a while at least.

"Aedan, you ok?" I asked him, and then I heard a response.

"Yes." He responded a little dull.

"Are you sure?" I asked him, and a sigh came from him. "Aedan?" I asked again.

"Tragedy, you don't like one of those guys, do you?" He asked, and it sounded like a little plead.

"No..." I said. I didn't know if it was true or not. I knew I didn't return the liking Locke had for me, but Tyler...I didn't know.

"Good." He said, but he sounded different. He didn't sound like the same Aedan I knew, he sounded like...I don't know, it was too hard to describe in words alone.

"Why?" I asked, wondering what he was trying to say. I heard him sigh. "Aedan, what's wrong? You can tell me anything." I said to him, hoping he would tell me what was wrong.

"...No, I can't. You'd think I was a loser if I told you." He said. Man, was this irritating me. Aedan wasn't usually this difficult. Jaden was usually this difficult, not being able to say what he wanted to say.

"Aedan, come on! You've known me forever! Just spill it out!" I whined into the telephone. Another sigh.

"Tragedy, I love you." Aedan said. My heart almost stopped. Great, my best friend in the universe has a crush on me! Ah! Three guys now in less than three days! Oh my goodness gracious this was getting too weird for me to handle. I blushed a dark red, not being able to say a thing.

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	7. Chapter 7

VII. Ruby

I stared at my wall, in total shock. Aedan had just confessed his love to me over the telephone. _Now _what was I supposed to do?

"Um, thanks, Aedan." Was all I could say, at the moment. I heard Aedan make a soft chuckle, and I just made a tentative smile.

"I'm sorry for acting rude by laughing, but you just sound so surprised and confused." He apologized, but I said nothing. Just silence.

"Aedan, I'm sorry but—,"

"No, don't worry about it. I knew that you probably wouldn't share the same feelings for me. We're better just friends, right?" He asked, oh great. Now I felt guilty and sad, but there was something in me that just rang that he was better as my friend than boyfriend was.

"A-Aedan? Was that all you wanted to call me for? Was to see if I loved you back?" I asked, thinking that maybe he only called to confess his love.

No response.

"Aedan? Are you there?" I asked, hoping he hadn't hung up on me.

"Yeah."

"Yeah to what? The question or are you still there?" I asked, ok, I was getting a little confused at what he meant.

"To both." He told me, I could tell he was embarrassed, but Aedan seemed to so different from the one I had always known. He seemed more...I don't know, but it felt like he only wanted to be my friend if I told him I loved him...the problem was that I _did _love him, but not the way he thought. I loved him as a brother, not a lover.

"Aedan..." I said his name, my voice somewhat full of sorrow. He sighed on the other line, and I just continued to look down. "I love you, Aedan, but not like you think of it. Aedan, I _can't _be your girlfriend, even if I tried. You're too much like a loving brother than a boyfriend." I told him, and I could feel that my eyes were welling up with crystal tears.

"Oh, I understand." He sorrowfully told me. Ok, now I felt like I was hurting him, which was probably what I was doing.

"I-I'm so sorry, Aedan. I have to go...I'm so sorry." I said. I was seriously hurting him, because on the other line, I could hear sniffles. He was crying, and I was the cause of it.

"Y-Yeah, I have to go too. I'll talk to you later, Tragedy." He said, and hung up before I could say good-bye.

Ugh! I felt guilty. I used telekinesis to move my cell phone to my desk again. I fell back on my bed and hugged my pillow. My chest ached, and I knew that I was hurting everyone.

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I eventually fell asleep, and began to dream. My dream was different, actually it wasn't a dream, it was a nightmare. So this is was happened.

I was outside, and the sky was a pitch-black, and in the sky was a huge, gigantic, crimson-colored sphere that gave off a ruby glow ever so elegantly. The sight of it was marvelous, but it was also frightening because what the sphere was.

It was the moon.

I knew this wasn't real, but I didn't know if it was going to happen. I had guessed that most of my reveries were visions, just like the bleeding flower was one. Although, the serpent in the Eden Garden, I didn't know if that was a real vision or not. It could be, but I doubt that.

Anyways, with the dream, so there I was, within the gates of my house, with Dom and Con with me, on both sides of me. In front of me, the hybrid named Tyler. His gorgeous topaz eyes always left an effect on me, even in this reverie.

"Hey, Tragedy." His voice said to me, alluringly. His body went from pale, to a gnarly cerulean-blue type. I could see that his skin looked rough, and I knew it was also probably slimy, like a snake.

"T-Tyler." I stuttered. Dominique had snarled at Tyler with fury and over-protection. Constance had clung to my leg as if she was scared to death of the hybrid. Tyler was nice...wasn't he?

"Stay away from her half-blood." Dominique hissed, and Tyler frowned. He took a step closer to me, which made Dominique even more crazier.

"Dom, leave him—,"

I woke up from hearing a scream.

Who was screaming? I didn't have time to think, I jumped out of my bed and ran out of the door. Dominique had obviously heard the scream too. We both looked around and ran into Constance's room. She was sitting in front of a TV that was in her room, laughing so hard she was screaming.

Dominique and I sighed in relief. She wasn't hurt. She was laughing. Dominique scowled at her and folded his arms to his muscular chest.

"Con, don't scare us like that again!" He yelled and I glanced at him. Constance innocently looked over at us.

"I-I didn't mean to...I was just laughing..." She said. I couldn't tell what movie she was watching.

"Constance, what movie are you watching?" I asked her. She pointed to the TV with giggles escaping from her.

"I think it's called _Napoleon Dynamite_. It's so funny!" She cheered, and I laughed. I understood now why she was laughing so hard. _Napoleon Dynamite _was probably the stupidest yet the funniest movie that ever existed.

"Tina! You fat lard! Come and get some dinner!" I heard one of the lines the main character, _Napoleon Dynamite_, said. We all started laughing. I peered into Dominique's thoughts, and saw that he was going to have breakfast.

"Um, I'm going to go eat." He stated, running his big pale fingers through his sleek black hair. I nodded, and followed behind him.

"Chill out, Dom." I said to him, reading his thoughts about how furious and angry he was with her.

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"How am I supposed to 'chill out' if she starts screamin'?" He looked at me with his obsidian eyes that were now icy cold.

"She's only six." I calmly responded to his answer. He sighed and nodded his head.

"Well, she shouldn't start screaming." He said coldly, his voice slightly hoarse from fuming so much.

"She was laughing. I mean, heck, I'd laugh and scream if I was watching _Napoleon Dynamite_." I said with a chuckle in my voice. Dominique rolled his coal eyes and walked down the marble steps with me.

"Still, she scared me. I had a bad dream about her dying, and I don't want that nightmare to come true." He said, looking down. His messy jet-black locks falling in front of his obsidian eyes.

"...Don't worry about her so much. I know we're her older siblings, but you can't be so over-protective of her. Like you said, she's strong." I said, with no emotion in my voice. It was dull, like a blank piece of paper.

"Whatever." Was what he told me, as he passed by me to go get a box of Honeycomb cereal out. I walked by him and placed a slice of white bread into the toaster. I watched him as he went to get a bowl and spoon, and then walk over to get the jug of milk from the refrigerator. My toast popped up after a couple of minutes, and I spread some butter on the piece of toast, and took a bite. I continued to watch Dominique eat his cereal until we both finished.

I walked up the marble steps again. I had forgotten that today was Saturday, and that we didn't need to go to school today...Yes! Freedom at last! I also felt a little better because today I didn't have to face my vampiric friends and Locke. I could just chill out at home, and relax. No homework, nothing to worry about.

That was, until Mom came up to me.

"Dear, come on." She said to me, grabbing my wrist and pulling me outside. Where was she taking me? And what was happening?

"Mom, where are we going?" I asked, curious.

"I'm going to show you all what an angel can do." She whispered to me so that I was the only one who could hear.

"Oh." I simply said.

Mom took me to the backyard. She looked around, and then walked me towards the emerald forest. We walked farther, and I was quiet. We walked until we were out of human sight.

"All right. Show me what you know so far." She told me, and stood about a good five feet away from me. I nodded my head. I looked around and picked a boulder out from the ground with my telekinesis. I dropped the rock with ease. I know that in most movies, they make it put pressure on you when someone would pick up a heavy object with their thoughts, but seriously, it didn't hurt.

From the corner of my ruby eyes, I could see my mom smiling at me warmly. I read her mind, which was something I could also do well with. _You are doing so well, Tragedy. _She said in her heart. I couldn't help but feel so proud of myself. Then, I spread my wings, and took flight into the air. I looked so celestial, and angelic. I felt free, like there were no boundaries in the world that I lived in.

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I landed on the ground with elegance, and my mother smiled warmly at me while clapping her hands.

"Bravo, bravo!" She cheered softly and I laughed, making a bow. My wings went back into where they came from.

"Thanks, Mom." I said, feeling a little embarrassed by all the congratulating. She walked over to me and stood next to me.

"All right, next thing you need to know is that you need to know is to never let your guard down in a fight. _Never_. Don't listen to any distractions, and just concentrate. Forget about the past, and worry about the present, because if you don't, you can change your future. You need to realize also that you can't let your anger control you. Anger only destroys and does nothing good, the same with hatred." My mother explained. I felt like I was in the military considering how she was treating and talking to me.

"Do I get a halo?" I asked. Angels were always pictured with halos on the top of their heads. Mother shook her head and laughed.

"_No_, you do not get a halo. It'd be nice though, wouldn't it?" She said with a caring smile that exposed her perfect white teeth.

"Yeah, I'd look pretty hot with a halo." I said, laughing. My mother gently slapped me on the back. She would have probably slapped harder, except for the fact that she would smash me to the ground.

"All right, enough of that. Next thing is that you can use a light ball, which is formed by conducting light energy into a sphere shape, and then tossing it at your opponent. Watch." She said. She held her hands out and concentrated, hard. I could tell. She closed her eyes and breathed evenly. I saw a huge, bright light forming between her hands, and suddenly, she threw it at a tree that burned to ashes. My scarlet eyes widened slightly.

"Whoa..." I said. Mother stood now ten feet away from me with a warm smile on her face, gesturing towards me.

"Your turn. Just think of the things that make you smile, or laugh, or just happy." She said. I closed my eyes and tried to think. I thought of my friends, especially Aedan. I could feel some sort of energy beginning to form between my hands. I opened my eyes to see the bright ball. "Now throw it anywhere except the relic and I." My mother said and I threw it at a huge rock that turned to dust. She began to clap her hands again.

"Great job! All right, to learn more about your opponents. I'm guessing that Dominique already informed you of who they were?" She asked, raising an eyebrow as she eyed me with her ruby eyes.

"Vampires, _hybrids_, and demons." I stressed the word on hybrids since she was meaning how I was almost flirting with a hybrid at the Outback Steakhouse. She nodded her head, her smile disappearing to a serious look on her porcelain face.

"Good. Now, vampires have amazing speed, and very good strength, but their defense is poor. While having speed, and strength, they lack the power to have a strong body. Vampires are powerful, I have to admit, and hard to defeat. Besides the blood of humans and angels, they drink much milk to get their calcium and eat plenty of protein so their bones toughen up so they _can _have a strong body. When at the age of eighteen, vampires instantly want the lust for blood, also known as bloodlust. Most vampires drink at least about three pounds of blood, but they have to be careful not to kill their prey.

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"Most of the time, vampires are careful not to kill their prey. If they know their prey is close to death from blood lost, they instantly stop, and they have the power too also, but the taste of blood is very luscious, so occasionally, it's hard to stop because of how good the taste is. You know how you love breadsticks?" She asked me, and I nodded my head.

"Heck yeah! I love 'em to death!" I exclaimed, grinning a bit. My mother allowed a chuckle to escape from her lips.

"Well, blood is like that to vampires, but angels' blood is even _more _luscious," She told me, and I blinked. I was an angel, and four of my friends were vampires. If they took _one _sip of my blood, would they really end up killing me for it? No, they wouldn't. They weren't _that _evil. "But then there are vampires that are made of pure evil, and kill to have all the blood they want." She said, and my heart jumped. I had hoped none of my friends were like that.

"Vampires don't have many other powers besides speed and strength, but I still want you to be careful around them. I know you have friends who are vampires, just stay away from them, just in case." She said, and I scowled at her. I folded my arms across my chest, continuing to scowl. She changed the subject.

"Hybrids. Now, Hybrids are _powerful_, and I mean _powerful_. They _formed_, which made them so powerful. They have superpowers, just like we do. They all control the element of water, and they also may transform into serpents. Most of the time, they are in their human forms, however, they cannot use any powers in that form. To use their powerful hybrid powers, they must be in their hybrids. Their hybrid form is a cerulean blue shade with gnarled skin. Their eyes become a glowing yellow color, and their skin becomes wet, they can truly be a gruesome-looking creature. You know what else they can do?" She asked me, looking at me.

"What?" Was my only response.

"They can transport wherever their hearts desire. They are probably the toughest opponent you could ever face, that is why I was acting so defensive to you when that waiter—,"

"His name's Tyler." I corrected.

"I was defensive when _Tyler_ was starting to flirt with you. That reminds me, hybrids are also _beautiful_ in human form, they're even dazzling. They allure their prey and then kill them afterwards. They mostly do it with humans, however. Though, it seemed as if he was trying to allure you." She said and looked away with a scowl.

"He did a good job, 'cause I was slightly falling for him, but what if he's really a good person?" I asked. Tyler seemed pretty nice, but of course, I didn't know him that well.

"Take no chances." She simply said and looked at me with seriousness in her red-orange eyes.

"He's Rynn's brother!" I blurted out, and she nodded.

"Exactly, which makes him even _more _dangerous considering he has a vampire for a sister." She said with a little glare in her eyes.

"Mom, Rynn's a nice person! Give her a chance!" I yelled out, whining. My mother shook her head.

"No, Tragedy. Stop it now, I need to continue this training." She said with a sigh.

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"_Training_?" I said, putting much emotion into the word 'training'. She nodded her head with a laugh.

"Of course, what did you think this was? A party?" She said with another laugh and I kicked her in the leg for being sarcastic with me. She made another laugh.

"Ok, what else do you got to teach me, Teach?" I asked her, and her facial expression went to seriousness again.

"Another enemy: demons. Demons are truly ugly. Red bulls with pure white eyes, which makes them frightening. They have no irises in their eyes, which gives them a demented look. They also have white horns on the tops of their heads, and occasionally, some have golden rings in their bull noses. They have the element of fire. They are _truly _frightening and intimidating creatures, though they are slow. They are huge though, at least probably about seven feet tall. They have unimaginable strength, and a tough body also." She said, the thought making her shiver slightly. I had an image of what they looked like, and it frightened me.

"Do they have a human form too?" I asked, wondering what they would look like as a _human_, which was hard since they were too scary to imagine as a human. I couldn't exactly get a mental imagine in my head, and I had hoped I wouldn't get to see a visual image.

"Yes. Their eyes are still white, but not as white. They have extremely pale skin, and don't look as lovely as a hybrid does. Demons and hybrids are opposites, but they both work together." She said with another sigh coming from her lips. My fingers started to entwine with each other.

"...So, what about the werewolves?" I asked her. A smile crept onto her lips.

"Werewolves are neutrals with violet eyes that look like a blue shade. They become what they are at age of twenty, and are very dazzling as well. They have tan skin unlike the other supernatural creatures, and may transform into a wolf. It is rare for them ever to attack, and is even rarer for them to kill, but they are not as strong as you imagine them to be. They're fast, quick-tempered, and about as strong as a normal human being is. They are though one of the most naturally-loving creatures." She said with a soft smile lifting her face. I gave a smile back.

"Anything more 'bout angels?" I asked, not wanting to know more about my enemies. I was too frightened to know what _else _they could do. My mom looked at me and then nodded.

"Oh yes, I forgot something. White-winged angels' skin burns at the touch of rain. The reason? We are supposed to resemble light and happiness, but rain reflects sadness, so our skin burns at the touch of it." She said, looking around.

"What about snow?"

"Nothing really happens, it's cold, and that's all." She said, rubbing the back of her neck with her porcelain hand.

"So...now what?" I asked, not knowing what was going to come next. She smirked at me.

"Hand-to-hand combat. I want you to try and hit me as hard as you can without any powers." She said to me, beckoning to come and hit her.

"No way! You're my mom! I can't hit you!" I yelled loudly.

"I guess I'll just hit you first then." She said, running towards me.

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My mother lunged towards me; she was serious. I hurried out of her way and blinked. I started to run, but she was too fast for me as she shoved me from behind, and I fell to the ground.

"Hey!" I shrieked. She made a little "tsk tsk" at me while smirking down at me. I sat up, jumping lightly to my feet. I made a defensive stand as she laughed a little.

"That's my girl! Now, I want you not to run, but fight. Running can occasionally be a disadvantage, and if you haven't run as far as miles, then it will _really _be a disadvantage." She instructed me, and I smirked. I started to walk towards her, and she cautiously walked around me. I jumped at her, closing my eyes as I started landing punches until I heard a snap. I blinked, and forced my eyes open to see what I snapped.

I had broken a tree.

My eyes slightly widened. Thank God it wasn't my mom that snapped. I breathed a sigh of relief. Behind me, my mom was laughing.

"What?" I asked her.

"You aren't supposed to close your eyes, sweetheart." She told me, and I laughed a little. Why the heck did I close my eyes?

"Why am I doing this hand-to-hand combat anyways when I can use my powers?" I questioned her, and she rolled her eyes.

"What did I just tell you, Tragedy? Hybrids are immune to angelic powers. Those light spheres or your telekinetic powers would have no effect on them. To defeat them you have to use hand-to-hand combat." She told me, and then I looked up at her.

"Do their powers affect angels?" I asked.

There was silence.

"Well?" I asked her, expecting an answer. I then realized why she didn't say anything. It was because hybrid powers _did _affect angels. That was so unfair! Well, like they say, life isn't fair, and neither are parents for that matter.

"Yes, they do affect angels." She told me solemnly. "But angels are strong. They have superhuman strength, but like Dominique, he has even _more _strength, which makes him powerful." She looked down a little, and a question popped into my mind.

"Can you be turned into a vampire?"

"...Yes, it's possible. It's difficult though. The vampire turning you has to drink all your blood, so you basically die, and then allow you to drink some of theirs. It's difficult, like I said, but it's possible." She told me, and I nodded my head.

"So, got anything else to teach me, master?" I said with a laugh in my tone. She smirked at me and flicked me in the forehead.

"Oh be quiet. Yes, I am done, for now at least. Let's go." She told me as she grabbed my wrist. I peeked into her mind to see if there was something going in her head, and apparently, there was, but how could I explain that to people like you?

In her mind, was an image of me becoming a vampire on a killing spree. Why would she even _think _that? I wouldn't turn into a vampire, and I wouldn't let anyone try to. I was strong, and I wasn't going to give into peer pressure easily. I nudged my with my arm and her ruby eyes slightly bulged, obviously realizing that I could read her mind. She looked down a little, embarrassed.

"Forget I even thought that, please, it'll make me feel better." She told me, and I nodded my head to her while we walked out of the emerald-green forest.

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"So...is Dad going to teach Dominique? What about Constance?" I asked, and Mother nodded her head.

"Dad will be teaching Dominique, I don't know about Constance though. It depends if it's an emergency or not. It would be fun to know what Constance's element is..." Her voice trailed off, and I nodded. What would little Constance's element be? Fire? Ice? Nature? It was hard to think about that right now, because it started to get cloudy. Mom grabbed my wrist, and pulled me to the house, suddenly, it began to rain.

Mom and I screeched in slight pain as the rain droplets splattered on our perfect porcelain skin. It burned, and it hurt, but it left no physical mark. We ran into the house. How hair was soaked, and we were as sore as ever. That rain literally hurt. It was like being shot in the arm a million times without mercy.

Mom was panting also; her voice was soft as she spoke to me, her eyes staring at the ground.

"Are you all right?" She asked me and I nodded. She gave me a loving smile. Constance ran up to us, frightened. Suddenly a big boom of thunder could be heard, and lightning lit up the darkening sky.

"Con, what's wrong?" I asked Constance, and she suddenly hugged me tightly, burying her tiny little face into my stomach. She was crying, and my shirt suddenly my shirt was drenched with her tears.

"It's scary!" She shrieked as another crack of thunder boomed. Mother sighed, picking Constance up and holding her. Constance buried her face into Mom's shoulder as the rain poured hard.

"It's all right, Constance. It'll be over soon." My mother said soothingly while stroking Constance's head.

"Soon as in, five hours?" Dominique said, walking in on our conversation. I gave a small scowl to him.

"Huh?" My mother asked.

"The storm's supposed to be over in about five hours." He said with dullness filling his voice up. I sighed. Great, can't go outside for five hours. Nothing to do in this house. Sounds like "Plan Boredom" to me.

"Dominique, Tragedy, how about you two go talk to your father?" My mother insisted. I exchanged glances with Dominique, and we both nodded at the exact same time.

"Okay, whatever." I plainly said. Mom nodded, continuing to stroke Constance's locks of charcoal. Constance continued to cry in fear, while Dominique and I walked up the marble staircase. We walked in silence the whole way up. Dominique and I walked into Mom and Dad's bedroom, and Dad was staring out the window.

"Dad?" Dominique asked, and Father turned around. We both looked at him as he gave a smile. Dad walked up to us, past us, and into the hallway.

"Follow me."

Dominique and I looked at each other, exchanging glances of confusion. We shrugged our shoulders and followed him. He walked to the end of the hallway of the west wing, where there was a rock wall. Dad pressed his hand against one of the blocks, and they suddenly went apart.

"Cool." Dominique simply said in awe.

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Dad laughed, and all three of us walked in. I thought I heard another set of footsteps when we walked in, but it was most likely my imagination. As we walked, I swear I could hear someone else's footsteps, so I turned around.

Constance was right behind us.

"Constance, what are you doing?" I asked her. Had she figured out what we were yet?

"Mommy said to come follow you guys." She said sweetly. Dominique and Dad had continued to walk on, ignoring us. I sighed and stared at her.

"Come on then." I said, but all of a sudden, Dad and Dominique were gone. I began to panic, and I could see Constance curiously looking around.

"Where did Daddy and Dominique go...?" Constance asked me, I just shook my head, looking around. Constance gripped my leg. Her obsidian eyes bulged, and I tried to push her away.

"Constance, stop it. We'll get out of here. Just relax." Suddenly, I saw what she was so scared about. Right in front of us was Tyler.

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	8. Chapter 8

VIII. Jasper

Tyler was right in front of us. How had he gotten in our house in the first place? I took a cautious step back, and he chuckled.

"What's wrong?" He asked. His voice was low, soft, and almost seductive. I tentatively took another step backwards.

"How d-did you get here, Tyler?" I asked with a stutter in my voice. He made another low chuckle. Constance cowered behind me.

"Tragedy, dear, that is none of your concern." He said. He was starting to get on my nerves, and then he saw Constance, and smirked. I took another step backwards, and scowled.

"What do you want?" I yelled at him. He made another laugh. He looked at Constance once more. He ignored my question.

"Hello, little one, how have you been since I last saw you?" Tyler said, his jasper-gold eyes glistening with slyness. I went from mesmerized, to scared. Tyler was truly frightening now, because his skin was a gnarled blue. His eyes were an even brightener jasper color, and he looked truly horrifying. Constance screamed loudly.

"What? Do you want to kill us?" I yelled at him. Constance cried into my leg. Tyler shook his head with a soft smirk on his lips.

"Not at all. I want you to trust me. Although I'm a hybrid and you're an angel that we can still be allies." He said, holding out his hand for me to grab. I pushed it away, and he sighed in fury. "Fine, you want to be difficult. I can handle difficult." I could see he was going to use some hydro attack, and I pushed Constance to the floor.

"Get down!" I screamed, and we fell while the water attack went where we were standing just a second ago. Constance cried in total fear, while I covered her body with my own. I was about to use my powers, but remembered what Mother had told me: angel powers don't work on hybrids.

"Now, do you surrender?" Tyler sounded like he was begging. It sounded like he didn't want to hurt me, but that he had to. I was silent for a moment, not being able to say anything from total fear.

"...What do you want with us?" I asked, and I could tell I was choking on the words since I was almost crying. Constance was frozen in her position under me.

"I want you to help me—,"

"Tragedy! Constance!" Dominique shouted. He and Dad had obviously broken the wall down. Tyler looked at them, and instantly disappeared. I looked around, only to see something green slither up my jeans, but luckily, the only person who saw that was I.

"Are you two ok?" My dad asked, Dominique looked scared, as if either Constance or I were almost killed, which could have easily happened.

"Yeah, we're fine." I said with a sigh. Dominique grabbed my wrist, and pulled

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me behind. Dad put Constance on his back, and we went through where the hole Dominique made was.

"What did you want to show us, Dad?" I asked, and he looked at me with a frustrated look on his pale face.

"I was going to show you different team combats." He said with a hiss in his tone. He seemed pretty made about the Tyler thing.

"What?" I asked.

"Team combat; working together." He simply told me. We walked into another room, a room with steel walls, bright lights on the ceiling, and weird gadgets around us. My dad suddenly left, and Tyler slithered out from the top of my shirt. I shrieked.

"Ew! Tyler! Get out!" I yelled, but at that moment, Dominique instantly grew defensive as he glared at Tyler in his snake form.

"You little—," Dominique hissed, reaching to go and probably squeeze the life out of Tyler.

"Easy, kid." Tyler said, with his British accent ever so lovely.

"Tyler, what do you want? We're—," I cut off was all of a sudden when I saw a large sepia dog. It was larger than a human being was, and it had brilliant amethyst eyes. I realized that this was a werewolf.

"Huh?" I asked, and Tyler slithered off me, and transformed to his cerulean-blue hybrid form. He looked at me with his goldenrod slits, and smiled.

"Hm. A werewolf. Your father is getting you kids through this competition. Wow, this is pretty darn lame if you ask me." He made a laugh, grinning a bit while I could see his teeth shimmer like pearls.

I got in my ready position, and saw that Constance was scared. I giggled and bent down.

"Don't worry about it, Con. Just focus on happy thoughts, and if you use some sort of power, hit it at that big wolf over there. Ok?"

"Ok Tragedy..."

I gave a smile of comfort, and heard yells from Dominique, only to see that he was charging towards the huge canine, along with Tyler. I could see Dad in the top right corner smiling in encouragement.

I looked to see that Tyler was already on the werewolf's back, and Dominique was using his agility to confuse the wolf. I ran over with Constance, and I attempted to use a light energy ball, but Dominique yelled at me.

"No, Tragedy, no! If you do that, you'll kill all three of us!" I looked at him, confused by what he meant of "the three of us." I instantly stopped, allowing my hands to drop to my sides. Constance cowardly stood behind me, her arms around my leg. I started to run, and I stopped once I heard Dad's voice on the intercom.

"Just so you kids don't get worried, this is a fake werewolf, not real, just fake. You, hybrid, you stay away from my family." My dad sent a glare to Tyler, but Tyler just smirked. Dominique tackled the hybrid, until we heard Dad's voice again. "Tragedy, Constance, you need to help also." I looked at Dad, and sighed. I began to run with Constance towards the monstrous thing.

"Tragedy, hold him down!" Dominique yelled. I eyed Tyler, who seemed to be smirking at me. I blinked, and held a stare with the robotic werewolf.

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"Hey, girl, hurry it up." Tyler commanded me. I blinked and used telekinesis to hold the wolf down. Unexpectedly, springs and screws popped from the wolf, and, it broke. I grinned, and so did Tyler.

"Good job Tragedy." Dominique congratulated me. He turned to Tyler, and frowned to him. He mumbled something to Tyler. "Thanks, It." I smacked Dominique on the back of the head for acting so rude to Tyler, and Tyler laughed.

"Yes, yes. You can all thank me, I know, I deserve your thanks." Tyler laughed, and I rolled my scarlet spheres. Dominique glared, Constance giggled. Tyler grinned, picking up Constance in his arms.

"Let go of her!" Dominique snarled. Tyler bellowed into laughter, swinging Constance around in the air.

"Oh, chill out, kid." Tyler calmly responded to him. Constance giggled freely as Tyler swung her around. "I'm harmless." He added to insure that he was a good person, which most likely he was.

"I wonder if Dad has anymore—," Before I could finish, a huge creature was looking like it was dying. Dad's voice came back on.

"All right. You need to use cooperation to keep this horse alive. You will be timed for ten minutes. Hurry, you might save this creature." We looked at each other. Dominique eyed Constance.

"Let's see what Constance can do first. Constance, concentrate on the horse. If you attack it, don't worry." He said calmly. Constance looked around, quivering a tiny bit. She closed her eyes, and I could see the image of the horse in her mind. Suddenly, the horse was healed.

"Whoa! Dude, what happened?" Tyler inquired. Constance opened her eyes, gasping in excitement. Dominique and I exchanged looks. Constance's element must have been healing.

"Her specialty must've been healing." I mumbled, watching Constance run to the horse and hugging its leg. I could see Tyler smiling warmly to Constance, obviously finding happiness in watching my younger sister so happy. Dominique glanced back and forth between Tyler and me. I immediately snapped out of it.

"Hey, Tragedy. I'm goin' back to the house." Dominique informed me. I nodded my head, telling him that was fine with me. He gave me a nudge on the arm, showing how Dad was glaring at Tyler. Within an instant, Dominique was gone. Father had obviously gone down some sort of stairway to get to the same level flooring we were at. Within another second, the horse disappeared also into thin air.

"Hybrid, get out of my sight. You disgusting monster." My father growled to Tyler. I glared to my father.

"Dad! Don't be so mean to Tyler! He helped us out!" I screamed to him. Dad just turned to give me a scowl.

"Tragedy, go to the house." He coldly replied while remaining calm.

"No!" I screamed. Tyler was at my side in a split second. His hand was over my mouth. He had morphed to his human form now.

"Tragedy, you should most likely listen to your father." Tyler told me softly. I frowned. It wasn't right for my dad to make a stereotype about Tyler. It wasn't right, and it wasn't fair.

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Tyler shoved me behind him and I ran, tears swelling in my eyes. How could Dad be so mean? I ran into the wall, opening it as I ran out of it. Constance somewhat was behind me in this entire ruckus.

"How come Daddy's mad?" Constance innocently inquired. I shook my head, traitor tears falling freely. I ran to my bedroom, slamming the door shut. I decided to get my cell phone, and dial Chalice's number. I remember before school ended, she had given me her number. I heard two rings until I heard a female's voice speak. "Hello?"

"Um, is Chalice there?" I questioned timidly and tentatively.

"This is her." Her voice was a dead-like tone.

"Hey Chalice, it's Tragedy."

"Hey girl!" Her voice morphed from dullness to enthusiasm.

"Uh, do you Rynn's brother? I think his name's Tyler?" I was hoping she'd say yes and explain to me who he was.

"Yeah...Why?"

"Oh, just wonderin'."

"Yeah, he's a pretty cool dude, if I may say so myself." She said with coolness in her tone. "How do you know Tyler?" She inquired me.

"He was a waiter to us at the Outback Steakhouse. He was pretty cute." I said, while a blush appeared a little.

"_Cute_? You have to be serious! He's gorgeous! No offence to Locke or anything, but Locke's pretty ugly compared to Tyler. I mean, Locke's a pretty hot guy, but Tyler's way better-looking." I had to agree with her. Locke was very cute, but Tyler had a better body to him.

"You won't believe this." I told her. She immediately asked what I meant. "My best friend from San Diego, Aedan Anderson, confessed his love to me over the phone last night!" I exclaimed then a gasp happened on the other line. "Weird, isn't it?"

"Tragedy, I have to go." She immediately told me, and hung up. I listened to the normal beeping until I hung up also. I pondered on what could have happened at her house. Possibly, her parents wanted to teach her vampire stuff. I forgot that Chalice wasn't eighteen until January. Then I remembered that vampires were born with their powers also.

I walked out onto the balcony, only to hear a voice behind me.

"Hey, Tragedy." A familiar voice told me. I turned around to see Aedan behind me. I was stunned and in complete shock when I saw that, Aedan was right there. How had he gotten here? For the first time, I noticed that Aedan's eyes were a scarlet color. He was a white-winged angel. I began to stammer.

"Oh, Aedan. I didn't see you...How did you get here. When did you turn—,"

"My birthday was in July, remember?" He calmly reminded me. I had forgotten that his birthday was July 30. I looked at him, hugging him for no apparent reason whatsoever.

"I missed you, Aedan! How's Jaden and Mac? What about Brianna, Violet, and Macy? When did you find out you were an angel?" I raced through my questions, and he placed a finger over my carnation-pink lips. He was smiling softly.

"They're all fine. I found out about a day before you left. I flew all the way here just to see you." He told me. I suddenly felt a little guilty. He came here because he most

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likely wanted to convince me to love him, which I couldn't do unless it was a sibling-type love. He flew all the way for nothing. I wished I didn't have to feel so guilty. I smiled softly to him.

"Aedan...I—," I stopped before I finished my sentence. I started over with a new topic. "—do you know what your element is?" I blinked and he gave a sly smile to me.

"My element...is emotion. That's why I've been able to be so close to you, because somehow, my powers went out of control before I turned eighteen. I somehow used my powers to make you comfortable around me." He gave another soft smile—the ones that I always loved about him.

"Hey, do you know if Jaden or Mac are...?" I didn't finish, and allowed the words to fade off while he shook his head.

"They're human, as well as Violet, Macy, and Brianna. I'm guessing another reason I've been able to stay close to you is because of what we are. White-winged angels. We understand each other better than anyone else." He placed his hand over my head, and I slightly quivered. I instantly pulled away, and he frowned a little.

"So, does that mean you can force someone to a certain emotion?" I questioned, hoping that he wouldn't force me to have the emotion of love for him. However, he nodded his head.

"Yes, I can. Like this." He closed his eyes softly, and I instantly felt anger rush through me like adrenaline. Suddenly, the anger faded to oblivion. I blinked.

"Whoa..." I told him with awe dripping off my tongue. He made a soft chuckle. He ruffled my scarlet hair a little bit.

"Yes, just like that. I know, it's quite a privilege to have such a..._unique_ element. What's yours, Tragedy?" He calmly, but sweetly, asked me.

"Telepathy." I immediately said to Aedan. I could see his eyebrows arch a bit at my immediate response. He kept his calm gently smile.

"That's so...interesting. What all can you do?" He entwined his fingers together, awaiting for what all I could do.

"Well, there's reading minds, and picking things up with my thoughts. I can pick up _anything_. From the tallest skyscraper, to the heaviest thing that exists. Heck, if I was in outer space, I could probably though the planet Pluto—"

"Uh, Tragedy, Pluto is a dwarf, not a planet." He corrected me, and I laughed. He started to laugh with me as well. I still couldn't believe that Aedan, _my _Aedan, flew all the way from _San Diego _to _Anchorage_.

"How long do you plan on staying here?" I gave a questioning smile. Aedan placed his index finger on his chin, thinking about what I asked.

"I really don't know. I guess I hadn't planned for that...yet." Aedan replied, a laugh in his soft voice. His voice was so lovely to listen to; it was almost like a lullaby that was singing me to sleep.

"Well, are you planning on staying here, like at the house? I mean, there's a guest room in the west wing." I shrugged my shoulders, as well as he did also. He allowed a blush to form on his porcelain cheeks. I blushed as well.

"Well, I was hoping on staying at your house. Your parents won't mind, will they?"

"Nah, they love ya, Aedan."

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I strode over to the door that led out to the hallway. Aedan followed me while smiling gently. He looked around with an arched eyebrow.

"Your house is really lovely, Trag." He called me by my nickname. I shrugged my shoulders.

"I don't know, it's ok, I guess." I chuckled at his response, which happened to be a laugh. He placed an arm around me, which started to make me feel a little uncomfortable, but I didn't say anything.

"Is the high school good here?" He randomly asked. I nodded my head.

"Yup." I simply said. He ruffled my hair and I laughed with him. We walked down the marble steps to see Dad standing in the middle of the entranceway. "Dad, Aedan's here." I told him dully, Aedan smiled kindly, his arm going back to his side. He knew Dad would kill him if he saw Aedan's or any other guy's arm around me.

"Aedan, how have you been?" Dad asked, just as he did, Mother came in, screaming with excitement as she ran in high-heel boots to hug Aedan.

"Oh Aedan, dear! How are you?" She squealed. It almost felt like Jarissa was in the room, but, unfortunately, she wasn't.

"I'm fine, thank you Mr. and Mrs. Hooding." He gave a soft smile to them, and Mother shook her head.

"Oh no! Just call me Lily!" She grinned broadly like a mother in a movie would. Dad turned to him with a manly smile.

"You can just call me Storm." Dad told him. Aedan nodded his head and smiled calmly to them. Mother patted him on the back and whispered in his ear.

"So, Aedan, what's your element? I never had the chance to ask you since you were always around Tragedy, and she had no knowing of what she were at the time. You know, keeping the secret until the right time." Mom smiled kindly to him while I rolled my eyes.

"My element...is emotion." He carved each word perfectly like an ice sculptor carving an ice swan for a wedding.

"Oh my, that is some element. Very useful, unlike mine." She said, looking down as she sighed.

"What is yours, if I may ask?" Aedan politely asked.

"Unlocking." Mother immediately told him. Aedan patted her back, and I could tell he used his powers to comfort her.

"It's quite all right. Nothing to worry about. Your element is very useful. Say someone kidnaps Tragedy or Dominique or Constance, you go out and unlock their cell to take them away." I could see that Mom was smiling, not because it comforted her, but because Aedan forced happiness into her system. Dad chuckled a little, noticing what I was seeing as well.

"Y-Yes, you're right." Mother stuttered. Aedan let go of her and kept his gentle calm smile on his porcelain face.

"So, Aedan, are you planning to spend your time here?" My father broadly inquired to Aedan. Aedan nodded his head with a soft expression that was filled with innocence and gentleness.

"Yes, I was hoping you would allow me to be a resident at your household. If you wouldn't mind, of course." Aedan directly asked Dad, and Father just gave a short nod.

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"The guest room is a couple doors down in the west wing. We'll get your things for you." My mother immediately told Aedan. I gave a simple smile while Dad and Mom took Aedan to the west wing, disappearing out of sight.

"They love him, don't they?" A familiar whisper told me. I turned around to see _him_.

"How do you do that?!" I quietly yelled. He gently laughed.

"Don't you believe in magic?" He teasingly asked me. I reached up to slap him, but then he grabbed my wrist, his hands were cold. He then quickly released my hands after an awkward moment of silence.

"I'm serious though, Tyler!"

"Fine, let's just say I transformed and have been slithering around listening to your conversations." He said with a frown.

"You mean you've been _stalking _me?! You loser!" I screamed at him, and he slapped his hand over my mouth, and kept his index finger to his lips.

"Shut up! Do you want the world to hear you?" He quietly scolded me. If I had dog-ears, they would bend down to my head.

"Sorry about that. Why are you following me? Why can't you _stalk_ one of Rynn's friends?" I asked him with a scowl. Tyler smirked.

"You _are _one of Rynn's friends though." Tyler kept his smirking grin on his face while I rolled my eyes once again.

"Any other of her friends that aren't _me_?" I looked at him, waiting for his response. There was total silence, and I could tell he was trying to make an excuse up.

"Well, perhaps they're more boring than you? I mean, Chalice is just looking at the sky, Jarissa is too chatty, and Veronica is well...silent. As for you, you're something more. You're _different_." He said with elegance, making emotion with each word he told me.

"_Different_? Oh, that makes me feel _so _much better. You're saying I'm a freak." I looked to him with a look that told him that I was a little mad.

"A freak? Yes, I suppose you _are _a freak, in a good way of course." He grinned at me. I kicked him in the leg—or at least attempted to—and he jumped out of the way, laughing. "You need to be a tiny bit quicker, Tragedy." He snickered. I glared to him with fire raging in my eyes.

"Tyler, get out!" I screamed to him. He scowled, turned into his hybrid form, and instantly disappeared within a flash. I looked down to see him in his serpent form. I kicked him. "Go! Leave me alone! What part of that don't you understand?!" I yelled once more. He transformed back into his blue form and ran out of the door. Coward. Scared of a girl—no, a _woman_—he was surely a coward. I looked around and then stared at a clock on the wall. 6:37 at night.

I plopped down on the floor, crossing my legs into a pretzel-shape while I just reminisced about my life, and then began to reverie about what my life would be like. I remembered my happy life with Aedan before moving, and then my life with him afterward. Would he still be the same Aedan, even when we grew older? What about Jaden, Mac, Violet, Brianna, and Macy? What would their life be? What would happen if they found out what my family was, and what Aedan was? How would they react to the secret? Would they start to hate us or do something completely different?

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I walked outside, the rain still pouring as I ran back inside. I lazily dragged myself to the living room, and plopped myself on the big, comfy chair, and turned the T.V. on. Apparently, _Charmed _was on. I laid back in the chair, exhausted from practice today, and instantly fell asleep when the first word came from Piper's lips.

My dream was of absolute nothing; oblivion; darkness. There was no dream of any sort. It was one of those dreams that all you dream about is a large black thing of nothing.

I woke up at my brother's voice.

"Tragedy, get your butt out of the couch and go get dressed for school. Idiot." He shook my body, causing me to fall off the chair and jump up with a scream. I realized that it was the next day, and it was Tuesday. Dominique snickered as if he did push me off the chair on purpose, which was most likely what he did. That loser-of-a-brother, he was going to pay for doing that. I ran behind Dominique, and leapt onto his back, laughing.

"Getty-up, horsy!" I screamed and rode him as if he was a bull. He pulled me off his back and threw me to the wall.

"What is your problem? Are you stupid? Get off your lazy butt and go!" Anger filled up Dominique's face; I knew he was getting upset, and going to lose his temper. I snickered, and ran up the stairs.

I ventured out to my room, closing my door behind me. I took off the clothes I was wearing yesterday. I grabbed a plain white turtleneck, feeling a chill in the Alaskan air. I grab a pair of Levi jeans and slipped them on my legs. I walked out of my room and into the hallway where I saw Aedan.

"What are you going to do while we're at school?" I questioned him. He gave a kind smile towards me. He didn't say anything, and I guessed he wanted me to guess and check what he was going to do. "You're going to school with us?"

"Yes...I am. If that's all right." Aedan raised an eyebrow at me, and I blankly nodded.

"Of course it is. Why wouldn't it?" I looked at him while he shrugged his shoulders. All of his movements were with elegance and calmness.

"Oh, nothing. Let's get to school." He said, as his words were quick like the roadrunner running from the coyote. I suspiciously looked at him, but he remained completely calm. I peered into his thoughts, to see if he was hiding anything.

_I wish she wouldn't look at me like that._ He thought. I took a step towards him while he stood as still as a statue.

"Why don't you want me to look at you like that?" I looked at him closely. He looked as if he was panicking, but I doubted that.

"Nothing, come on, let's go." He said with irritation a little in his tone. He grabbed my wrist and pulled me down the stairs as we walked out of the house. Dominique and Constance were already leaning against the gates.

"Aedan, if you're coming with me to school, at least don't act too protectively over me. Just because four of my best friends are vampires doesn't mean you and Dom have to treat me like a little girl." I gave a small sneer to him, and Aedan nodded his head to me.

"Hi Aedan!" Constance cheered. Aedan picked Constance up with a soft smile.

"Hello, Constance. How have you been?" He calmly asked her. She grinned.

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"Good! What about you?" She innocently asked. Dominique and I began to walk ahead of them. I glanced at him. I began to talk to Dom while Aedan talked to Con.

"So, surprised to see Aedan, huh?" I grinned at Dominique. He shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't know. It's pretty surprising, if you ask me. I mean, come on, the dude flew from San Diego to Anchorage—,"

"How did you know he was an angel?" I immediately interrupted him.

"I've known for a while, kid."

"Don't call me a kid!" I shrieked.

"Well, you _are _younger than me." He smirked.

"By like three minutes!"

"So what?" He said with a laugh. I smacked him on the back of the head, which caused him to laugh even _more_.

"Idiot!" I yelled to him. His roar of laughter grew louder and harder. He eventually clutched his stomach from the pain of laughing so hard.

"You're such a kid, Trag." Dom laughed.

"Oh shut up." I coldly said, glaring.

"Oh...Looks like someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today." Dom laughed more, and I smacked him again. More roar of laughter.

"Like you don't wake up in a bad mood!" I sneered angrily at him. Constance and Aedan continued to have their own little conversation with each other. Dominique frowned.

"That's different." He solemnly said. I could see the fun and games had come to an end.

"You know what? I feel like being evil today, so I'm going to embarrass you in front of all the girls at school! That'll teach you to not push me out of the couch!" I smirked at him, his face struck horror.

"Don't you dare..." His voice trailed off while he gave me a scowl.

"Yes I will!" I yelled, laughing as I ran off.

I was running free and wild. My hair whipped in the wind like flames burning in a fireplace. I laughed more, running and running more as I could see the school in view. Constance and Aedan were talking to each other still, while Dom looked at me in fear. I guessed that he believed I was serious about embarrassing him, which I wasn't. As I continued to run, I suddenly felt something metal hit me. I heard the sound of brakes slamming. My eyes widened as I felt instant pain in my stomach area. I began to question myself exactly what was causing the pain. The next thing I knew, I was unconscious.

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